JULIAN    HAWTHORN  K. 


CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS 


BY 


JULIAN   HAWTHORNE 


BOSTON 
TICKNOR    AND    COMPANY 

1887 


COPYRIGHT,  1886, 

BY  TlCKNOR  AND  COMPANY. 


All  Rights  Reserved. 


ELECTROTYPED   BY 

C.  J.  PETERS  &  SON,  BOSTON. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.  A  PRELIMINARY  CONFESSION .  9 

II.  NOVELS  AND  AGNOSTICISM 31 

III.  AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION 71 

IV.  LITERATURE  FOR  CHILDREN 100 

Y.   THE  MORAL  AIM  IN  FICTION 128 

VI.  THE  MAKER  OF  MANY  BOOKS 140 

VII.  MR.  MALLOCK'S  MISSING  SCIENCE 163 

VIII.  THEODORE  WINTHROP'S  WRITINGS 172 

IX.  EMERSON  AS  AN  AMERICAN 186 

X.  MODERN  MAGIC 218 

XI.  AMERICAN  WILD  ANIMALS  IN  ART 248 


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CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 


CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 


CHAPTER   I. 

A  PRELIMINARY   CONFESSION. 

IN  1869,  when  I  was  about  twenty-three  years 
old,  I  sent  a  couple  of  sonnets  to  the  revived  Put 
nam's  Magazine.  At  that  period  I  had  no  inten 
tion  of  becoming  a  professional  writer:  I  was 
studying  civil  engineering  at  the  Polytechnic 
School  in  Dresden,  Saxony.  Years  before,  I  had 
received  parental  warnings  —  unnecessary,  as  I 
thought  —  against  writing  for  a  living.  During 
the  next  two  years,  however,  when  I  was  acting 
as  hydrographic  engineer  in  the  New  York  Dock 
Department,  I  amused  myself  by  writing  a  short 
story,  called  "Love  and  Counter-Love,"  which  was 
published  in  Harper's  Weekly,  and  for  which  I  was 
paid  fifty  dollars.  "  If  fifty  dollars  can  be  so  easily 
earned,"  I  thought,  "  why  not  go  on  adding  to  my 
income  in  this  way  from  time  to  time  ?  "  I  was 
aided  and  abetted  in  the  idea  by  the  late  Robert 

9 


10  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

Carter,  editor  of  Appletons*  Journal;  and  the  lat 
ter  periodical  and  Harper's  Magazine  had  the  bur 
den,  and  I  the  benefit,  of  the  result.  When,  in 
1872,  I  was  abruptly  relieved  from  my  duties  in 
the  Dock  Department,  I  had  the  alternative  of 
either  taking  my  family  down  to  Central  America 
to  watch  me  dig  a  canal,  or  of  attempting  to  live 
by  my  pen.  I  bought  twelve  reams  of  large  letter- 
paper,  and  began  my  first  work,  —  "  Bressant."  I 
finished  it  in  three  weeks ;  but  prudent  counsel 
lors  advised  me  that  it  was  too  immoral  to  publish, 
except  in  French :  so  I  recast  it,  as  the  phrase  is, 
and,  in  its  chastened  state,  sent  it  through  the 
post  to  a  Boston  publisher.  It  was  lost  on  the 
way,  and  has  not  yet  been  found.  I  was  rather 
pleased  than  otherwise  at  this  catastrophe ;  for  I 
had  in  those  days  a  strange  delight  in  rewriting 
my  productions:  it  was,  perhaps,  a  more  sensi 
ble  practice  than  to  print  them.  Accordingly,  I 
rewrote  and  enlarged  "  Bressant "  in  Dresden 
(whither  I  returned  with  my  family  in  1872) ;  but 
—  immorality  aside  —  I  think  the  first  version  was 
the  best  of  the  three.  On  my  way  to  Germany  I 
passed  through  London,  and  there  made  the  ac 
quaintance  of  Henry  S.  King,  the  publisher,  a 
charming  but  imprudent  man,  for  he  paid  me  one 


A  PRELIMINARY  CONFESSION.  11 

hundred  pounds  for  the  English  copyright  of  my 
novel:  and  the  moderate  edition  he  printed  is,  I 
believe,  still  unexhausted.  The  book  was  received 
in  a  kindly  manner  by  the  press ;  but  both  in  this 
country  and  in  England  some  surprise  and  indig 
nation  were  expressed  that  the  son  of  his  father 
should  presume  to  be  a  novelist.  This  sentiment, 
whatever  its  bearing  upon  me,  has  undoubtedly 
been  of  service  to  my  critics :  it  gives  them  some 
thing  to  write  about.  A  disquisition  upon  the  man 
tle  of  Nathaniel  Hawthorne,  and  an  analysis  of  the 
differences  and  similarities  between  him  and  his 
successor,  generally  fill  so  much  of  a  notice  as  to 
enable  the  reviewer  to  dismiss  the  book  itself  very 
briefly.  I  often  used  to  wish,  when,  years  after 
wards,  I  was  myself  a  reviewer  for  the  London 
Spectator,  that  I  could  light  upon  some  son  of 
his  father  who  might  similarly  lighten  my  labors. 
Meanwhile,  I  was  agreeably  astonished  at  what  I 
chose  to  consider  the  success  of  "  Bressant,"  and 
set  to  work  to  surpass  it  in  another  romance,  called 
(for  some  reason  I  have  forgotten)  "Idolatry." 
This  unknown  book  was  actually  rewritten,  in 
whole  or  in  part,  no  less  than  seven  times.  Non 
sum  quails  eram.  For  seven  or  eight  years  past  I 
have  seldom  rewritten  one  of  the  many  pages  which 


12  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

circumstances  have  compelled  me  to  inflict  upon 
the  world.  But  the  discipline  of  "Idolatry"  prob 
ably  taught  me  how  to  clothe  an  idea  in  words. 

By  the  time  "  Idolatry "  was  published,  the 
year  1874  had  come,  and  I  was  living  in  London. 
From  my  note-books  and  recollections  I  compiled 
a  series  of  papers  on  life  in  Dresden,  under  the 
general  title  of  "Saxon  Studies."  Alexander 
Strahan,  then  editor  of  the  Contemporary  Review, 
printed  them  in  that  periodical  as  fast  as  I  wrote 
them,  artd  they  were  reproduced  in  certain  eclectic 
magazines  in  this  country,  —  until  I  asserted  my 
American  copyright.  Their  publication  in  book 
form  was  followed  by  the  collapse  of  both  the 
English  and  the  American  firm  engaging  in  that 
enterprise.  I  draw  no  deductions  from  that  fact : 
I  simply  state  it.  The  circulation  of  the  "  Studies  " 
was  naturally  small ;  but  one  copy  fell  into  the 
hands  of  a  Dresden  critic,  and  the  manner  in  which 
he  wrote  of  it  and  its  author  repaid  me  for  the  la 
bor  of  composition  and  satisfied  me  that  I  had  not 
done  amiss. 

After  "  Saxon  Studies  "  I  began  another  novel, 
"  Garth,"  instalments  of  which  appeared  from 
month  to  month  in  Harper's  Magazine.  When  it 
had  run  for  a  year  or  more,  with  no  signs  of  abate- 


A  PRELIMINARY  CONFESSION.  13 

ment,  the  publishers  felt  obliged  to  intimate  that 
unless  I  put  an  end  to  their  misery  they  would. 
Accordingly,  I  promptly  gave  Garth  his  quietus. 
The  truth  is,  I  was  tired  of  him  myself.  With  all 
his  qualities  and  virtues,  he  could  not  help  being 
a  prig.  He  found  some  friends,  however,  and  still 
shows  signs  of  vitality.  I  wrote  no  other  novel  for 
nearly  two  years,  but  contributed  some  sketches 
of  English  life  to  Appletontf  Journal,  and  pro 
duced  a  couple  of  novelettes,  —  "Mrs.  Gainsbor 
ough's  Diamonds"  and  "Archibald  Malmaison," 
—  which,  by  reason  of  their  light  draught,  went 
rather  farther  than  usual.  Other  short  tales,  which 
I  hardly  care  to  recall,  belong  to  this  period.  I 
had  already  ceased  to  take  pleasure  in  writing  for 
its  own  sake,  —  partly,  no  doubt,  because  I  was 
obliged  to  write  for  the  sake  of  something  else. 
Only  those  who  have  no  reverence  for  literature 
should  venture  to  meddle  with  the  making  of  it, — 
unless,  at  all  events,  they  can  supply  the  demands 
of  the  butcher  and  baker  from  an  independent 
source. 

In  1879,  "  Sebastian  Strome  "  was  published  as 
a  serial  in  All  the  Year  Round.  Charley  Dickens, 
the  son  of  the  great  novelist,  and  editor  of  the 
magazine,  used  to  say  to  me  while  the  story  was 


14  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

in  progress,  "  Keep  that  red-haired  girl  up  to  the 
mark,  and  the  story  will  do."  I  took  a  fancy  to 
Mary  Dene  myself.  But  I  uniformly  prefer  my 
heroines  to  my  heroes ;  perhaps  because  I  invent 
the  former  out  of  whole  cloth,  whereas  the  latter 
are  often  formed  of  shreds  and  patches  of  men  I 
have  met.  And  I  never  raised  a  character  to  the 
position  of  hero  without  recognizing  in  him,  be 
fore  I  had  done  with  him,  an  egregious  ass.  Differ 
as  they  may  in  other  respects,  they  are  all  breth 
ren  in  that ;  and  yet  I  am  by  no  means  disposed 
to  take  a  Carlylese  view  of  my  actual  fellow-crea 
tures. 

I  did  some  hard  work  at  this  time :  I  remember 
once  writing  for  twenty-six  consecutive  hours 
without  pausing  or  rising  from  my  chair;  and 
when,  lately,  I  re-read  the  story  then  produced,  it 
seemed  quite  as  good  as  the  average  of  my  work 
in  that  kind.  I  hasten  to  add  that  it  has  never 
been  printed  in  this  country :  for  that  matter,  not 
more  than  half  my  short  tales  have  found  an 
American  publisher.  "  Archibald  Malmaison " 
was  offered  seven  years  ago  to  all  the  leading  pub 
lishers  in  New  York  and  Boston,  and  was  promptly 
refused  by  all.  Since  its  recent  appearance  here, 
however,  it  has  had  a  circulation  larger  perhaps 


A  PRELIMINARY  CONFESSION.  15 

than  that  of  all  my  other  stories  combined.  But 
that  is  one  of  the  accidents  that  neither  author  nor 
publisher  can  foresee.  It  was  the  horror  of  "Ar 
chibald  Malmaison,"  not  any  literary  merit,  that 
gave  it  vogue, — its  horror,  its  strangeness,  and  its 
brevity. 

On  Guy  Fawkes's  day,  1880,  I  began  "  Fortune's 
Fool," — or  "Luck,"  as  it  was  first  called,  —  and 
wrote  the  first  ten  of  the  twelve  numbers  in  three 
months.  I  used  to  sit  down  to  my  table  at  eight 
o'clock  in  the  evening  and  write  till  sunrise.  But 
the  two  remaining  instalments  were  not  written 
and  published  until  1883,  and  this  delay  and  its 
circumstances  spoiled  the  book.  In  the  interval 
between  beginning  and  finishing  it  another  long 
novel  —  "  Dust "  -  was  written  and  published.  I 
returned  to  America  in  1882,  after  an  absence  in 
Europe  far  longer  than  I  had  anticipated  or  de 
sired.  I  trust  I  may  never  leave  my  native  land 
again  for  any  other  on  this  planet. 

"Beatrix  Randolph,"  "Noble  Blood,"  and  "Love 
—  or  a  Name,"  are  the  novels  which  I  have  writ 
ten  since  my  return  ;  and  I  also  published  a  biog 
raphy,  "  Nathaniel  Hawthorne  and  his  Wife."  I 
cannot  conscientiously  say  that  I  have  found  the 
literary  profession  —  in  and  for  itself  —  entirely 


16  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

agreeable.  Almost  everything  that  I  have  writ 
ten  has  been  written  from  necessity ;  and  there  is 
very  little  of  it  that  I  shall  not  be  glad  to  see  for 
gotten.  The  true  rewards  of  literature,  for  men  of 
limited  calibre,  are  the  incidental  ones,  —  the  val 
uable  friendships  and  the  charming  associations 
which  it  brings  about.  For  the  sake  of  these 
I  would  willingly  endure  again  many  passages 
of  a  life  that  has  not  been  all  roses ;  not  that  I 
would  appear  to  belittle  my  own  work :  it  does 
not  need  it.  But  the  present  generation  (in 
America  at  least)  does  not  strike  me  as  containing 
much  literary  genius.  The  number  of  undersized 
persons  is  large  and  active,  and  we  hardly  believe 
in  the  possibility  of  heroic  stature.  I  cannot  suffi 
ciently  admire  the  pains  we  are  at  to  make  our 
work  —  embodying  the  aims  it  does  —  immacu 
late  in  form.  Form  without  idea  is  nothing,  and 
we  have  no  ideas.  If  one  of  us  were  to  get  an 
idea,  it  would  create  its  own  forai,  as  easily  as 
does  a  flower  or  a  planet.  I  think  we  take  our 
selves  too  seriously :  our  posterity  will  not  be 
nearly  so  grave  over  us.  For  my  part,  I  do  not 
write  better  than  I  do,  because  I  have  no  ideas 
worth  better  clothes  than  they  can  pick  up  for 
themselves.  "  Whatever  is  worth  doing  at  all  is 


A  PRELIMINARY  CONFESSION.  17 

worth  doing  with  your  best  pains,"  is  a  saying 
which  has  injured  our  literature  more  than  any 
other  single  thing:  How  many  a  lumber-closet 
since  the  world  began  has  been  filled  by  the  re 
sults  of  this  purblind  and  delusive  theory !  But 
this  is  not  autobiographical,  —  save  that  to  have 
written  it  shows  how  little  prudence  my  life  has 
taught  me. 

I  remember  wondering,  in  1871,  how  anybody 
could  write  novels.  I  had  produced  two  or  three 
short  stories ;  but  to  expand  such  a  thing  until  it 
should  cover  two  or  three  hundred  pages  seemed 
an  enterprise  far  beyond  my  capacity.  Since  then, 
I  have  accomplished  the  feat  only  too  often ;  but 
I  doubt  whether  I  have  a  much  clearer  idea  than 
before  of  the  way  it  is  done ;  and  I  am  certain  of 
never  having  done  it  twice  in  the  same  way.  The 
manner  in  which  the  plant  arrives  at  maturity 
varies  according  to  the  circumstances  in  which 
the  seed  is  planted  and  cultivated ;  and  the  cul 
tivator,  in  this  instance  at  least,  is  content  to 
adapt  his  action  to  whatever  conditions  happen 
to  exist. 

While,  therefore,  it  might  be  easy  to  formulate 
a  cut-and-dried  method  of  procedure,  which  should 


18  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

be  calculated  to  produce  the  best  results  by  the 
most  efficient  means,  no  such  formula  would  truly 
represent  the  present  writer's  actual  practice.  If  I 
ever  attempted  to  map  out  my  successive  steps 
beforehand,  I  never  adhered  to  the  forecast  or 
reached  the  anticipated  goal.  The  characters  de 
velop  unexpected  traits,  and  these  traits  become 
the  parents  of  incidents  that  had  not  been  contem 
plated.  The  characters  themselves,  on  the  other 
hand,  cannot  be  kept  to  any  preconceived  charac 
teristics;  they  are,  in  their  turn,  modified  by  the 
exigencies  of  the  plot. 

In  two  or  three  cases  I  have  tried  to  make  por 
traits  of  real  persons  whom  I  have  known ;  but 
these  persons  have  always  been  more  lifeless  than 
the  others,  and  most  lifeless  in  precisely  those  fea 
tures  that  most  nearly  reproduced  life.  The  best 
results  in  this  direction  are  realized  by  those  char 
acters  that  come  to  their  birth  simultaneously  with 
the  general  scheme  of  the  proposed  events ;  though 
I  remember  that  one  of  the  most  lifelike  of  my 
personages  (Madge,  in  the  novel  "Garth")  was 
not  even  thought  of  until  the  story  of  whicli  she  is 
the  heroine  had  been  for  some  time  under  con 
sideration. 

Speaking  generally,  I  should  suppose  that  the 


A  PRELIMINARY  CONFESSION.  19 

best  novels  are  apt  to  be  those  that  have  been  long 
est  in  the  novelist's  mind  before  being  committed 
to  paper;  and  the  best  materials  to  use,  in  the 
way  of  character  and  scenery,  are  those  that  were 
studied  not  less  than  seven  or  eight  years  previous 
to  their  reproduction.  Thereby  is  attained  that 
quality  in  a  story  known  as  atmosphere  or  tone, 
perhaps  the  most  valuable  and  telling  quality  of 
all.  Occasionally,  however,  in  the  rare  case  of  a 
story  that  suddenly  seizes  upon  the  writer's  imagi 
nation  and  despotically  "possesses"  him,  the  ai> 
mosphere  is  created  by  the  very  strength  of  the 
"possession."  In  the  former  instance,  the  writer 
is  thoroughly  master  of  his  subject ;  in  the  latter, 
the  subject  thoroughly  masters  him;  and  both 
amount  essentially  to  the  same  thing,  harmony 
between  subject  and  writer. 

With  respect  to  style,  there  is  little  to  be  said. 
Without  a  good  style,  no  writer  can  do  much ;  but 
it  is  impossible  really  to  create  a  good  style.  A 
writer's  style  was  born  at  the  same  time  and  under 
the  same  conditions  that  he  himself  was.  The 
only  rule  that  can  be  given  him  is,  to  say  what  he 
has  to  say  in  the  clearest  and  most  direct  way, 
using  the  most  fitting  and  expressive  words.  But 
often,  of  course,  this  advice  is  like  that  of  the  doc- 


20  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

tor  who  counsels  his  patient  to  free  his  mind  from 
all  care  and  worry,  to  live  luxuriously  on  the  fat 
of  the  land,  and  to  make  a  voyage  round  the 
world  in  a  private  yacht.  The  patient  has  not  the 
means  of  following  the  prescription.  A  writer 
may  improve  a  native  talent  for  style;  but  the 
talent  itself  he  must  either  have  by  nature,  or  for 
ever  go  without.  And  the  style  that  rises  to  the 
height  of  genius  is  like  the  Phoenix;  there  is 
hardly  ever  more  than  one  example  of  it  in  an 
age. 

Upon  the  whole,  I  conceive  that  the  best  way 
of  telling  how  a  novel  may  be  written  will  be  to 
trace  the  steps  by  which  some  one  novel  of  mine 
came  into  existence,  and  let  the  reader  draw  his 
own  conclusions  from  the  record.  For  this  pur 
pose  I  will  select  one  of  the  longest  of  my  produc 
tions,  "  Fortune's  Fool." 

It  is  so  long  that,  rather  than  be  compelled  to 
read  it  over  again,  I  would  write  another  of  equal 
length ;  though  I  hasten  to  add  that  neither  con 
tingency  is  in  the  least  probable.  In  very  few 
men  is  found  the  power  of  sustained  conception 
necessary  to  the  successful  composition  of  so  pro 
lix  a  tale ;  and  certainly  I  have  never  betrayed 
the  ownership  of  such  a  qualification.  The  tale, 


A  PRELIMINARY  CONFESSION.  21 

nevertheless,  is  an  irrevocable  fact ;  and  my  pres 
ent  business  it  is  to  be  its  biographer. 

When,  in  the  winter  of  1879,  the  opportunity 
came  to  write  it,  the  central  idea  of  it  had  been 
for  over  a  year  cooking  in  my  mind.  It  was  orig 
inally  derived  from  a  dream.  I  saw  a  man  who, 
upon  some  occasion,  caught  a  glimpse  of  a  woman's 
face.  This  face  was,  in  his  memory,  the  ideal  of 
beauty,  purity,  and  goodness.  Through  many 
years  and  vicissitudes  he  sought  it ;  it  was  his  re 
ligion,  a  human  incarnation  of  divine  qualities. 

At  certain  momentous  epochs  of  his  career,  he 
had  glimpses  of  it  again;  and  the  effect  was  al 
ways  to  turn  him  away  from  the  wrong  path  and 
into  the  right.  At  last,  near  the  end  of  his  life, 
he  has,  for  the  first  time,  an  opportunity  of  speak 
ing  to  this  mortal  angel  and  knowing  her ;  and 
then  he  discovers  that  she  is  mortal  indeed,  and 
chargeable  with  the  worst  frailties  of  mortality. 
The  moral  was  that  any  substitute  for  a  purely 
spiritual  religion  is  fatal,  and,  sooner  or  later,  re 
veals  its  rottenness. 

This  seemed  good  enough  for  a  beginning;  but, 
when  I  woke  up,  I  was  not  long  in  perceiving  that 
it  would  require  various  modifications  before  be 
ing  suitable  for  a  novel ;  -and  the  first  modifica- 


22  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

tions  must  be  in  the  way  of  rendering  the  plot 
plausible.  What  sort  of  a  man,  for  example,  must 
the  hero  be  to  fall  into  and  remain  in  such  an 
error  regarding  the  character  of  the  heroine  ?  He 
must,  I  concluded,  be  a  person  of  great  simplicity 
and  honesty  of  character,  with  a  strong  tinge  of 
ideality  and  imagination,  and  with  little  or  no 
education. 

These  considerations  indicated  a  person  desti 
tute  of  known  parentage,  and  growing  up  more 
or  less  apart  from  civilization,  but  possessing  by 
nature  an  artistic  or  poetic  temperament.  Fore- 
glimpses  of  the  further  development  of  the  story 
led  me  to  make  him  the  child  of  a  wealthy  English 
nobleman,  but  born  in  a  remote  New  England  vil 
lage.  His  artistic  proclivities  must  be  inherited 
from  his  father,  who  was,  therefore,  endowed  with 
a  talent  for  amateur  sketching  in  oils;  which 
talent,  again,  led  him,  during  his  minority,  to 
travel  on  the  continent  for  purposes  of  artistic 
study.  While  in  Paris,  this  man,  Floyd  Vivian, 
meets  a  young  Frenchwoman,  whom  he  secretly 
marries,  and  with  whom  he  elopes  to  America. 
Then  Vivian  receives  news  of  his  father's  death, 
compelling  him  to  return  to  England;  and  he 
leaves  his  wife  behind  him. 


A  PRELIMINARY   CONFESSION.  23 

A  child  (Jack,  the  hero  of  the  story)  is  born 
during  his  absence,  and  the  mother  dies.  Vivian, 
now  Lord  Castleman,  finds  reason  to  believe  that 
his  wife  is  dead,  but  knows  nothing  of  the  boy ; 
and  he  marries  again.  The  boy,  therefore,  is  left 
to  grow  up  in  the  Maine  woods,  ignorant  of  his 
parentage,  but  with  one  or  two  chances  of  finding 
it  out  hereafter.  So  far,  so  good. 

But  now  it  was  necessary  to  invent  a  heroine 
for  this  hero.  In  order  to  make  the  construction 
compact,  I  made  her  Jack's  cousin,  the  daughter 
of  Lord  Vivian's  younger  brother,  who  came  into 
being  for  that  purpose.  This  brother  (Murdock) 
was  a  black  sheep ;  and  his  daughter,  Madeleine, 
was  adopted  by  Lord  Vivian,  because  I  now  per 
ceived  that  Lord  Vivian's  conscience  was  going  to 
trouble  him  with  regard  to  his  dead  wife  and  her 
possible  child,  and  that  he  would  make  a  pilgrim 
age  to  New  England  to  settle  his  doubts,  taking 
Madeleine  with  him ;  intending,  if  no  child  by  the 
first  marriage  were  forthcoming,  to  make  Made 
leine  his  heir ;  for  he  had  no  issue  by  his  second 
marriage.  This  journey  would  enable  Jack  and 
Madeleine  to  meet  as  children.  But  it  was  neces 
sary  that  they  should  have  no  suspicion  of  their 
cousinship.  Consequently,  Lord  Vivian,  who  alone 


24  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

could  acquaint  them  with  this  fact,  must  die  in  the 
very  act  of  learning  it  himself.  And  what  should 
be  the  manner  of  his  death  ? 

At  first,  I  thought  he  should  be  murdered  by 
his  younger  brother;  but  I  afterwards  hit  upon 
another  plan,  that  seemed  less  hackneyed  and  pro 
vided  more  interesting  issues.  Murdock  should 
arrive  at  the  Maine  village  at  the  same  time  as 
Lord  Vivian,  and  upon  the  same  errand,  to  get 
hold  of  Lord  Vivian's  son,  of  whose  existence  he 
had  heard,  and  whom  he  wished  to  get  out  of  the 
way,  in  order  that  his  own  daughter,  Madeleine, 
might  inherit  the  property.  Murdock  should  find 
Jack,  and  Jack,  a  mere  boy,  should  kill  him, 
though  not,  of  course,  intentionally,  or  even  con 
sciously  (for  which  purpose  the  machinery  of  the 
Witch's  Head  was  introduced). 

With  Murdock's  death,  the  papers  that  he  car 
ried,  proving  Jack's  parentage,  should  disappear, 
to  be  recovered  long  afterward,  when  they  were 
needed.  Lord  Vivian  should  quietly  expire  at  the 
same  time,  of  heart  disease  (to  which  he  was  forth 
with  made  subject),  and  Madeleine  should  be  left 
temporarily  to  her  own  devices.  Thus  was  brought 
about  her  meeting  with  Jack  in  the  cave.  It  was 
their  first  meeting ;  and  Jack  must  remember  her 


A  PRELIMINARY  CONFESSION.  25 

face,  so  as  to  recognize  her  when  they  meet,  years 
later,  in  England.  But,  as  it  was  beyond  belief  that 
the  girl's  face  should  resemble  the  woman's  enough 
to  make  such  a  recognition  possible,  I  devised  the 
miniature  portrait  of  her  mother,  which  Madeleine 
gave  to  Jack  for  a  keepsake,  and  which  was  the 
image  of  what  Madeleine  herself  should  afterward 
become. 

Something  more  was  needed,  however,  to  com 
plete  the  situation ;  and  to  meet  this  exigency,  I 
created  M.  Jacques  Malgrd,  the  grandfather  of 
Jack,  who  had  followed  his  daughter  to  America, 
in  the  belief  that  she  had  been  seduced  by  Vivian ; 
who  had  brought  up  Jack,  hating  him  for  his 
father's  sake,  and  loving  him  for  his  mother's 
sake  ;  and  who  dwelt  year  after  year  in  the  Maine 
village,  hoping  some  day  to  wreak  his  vengeance 
upon  the  seducer.  But  when  M.  Malgre  and 
Vivian  at  last  meet,  this  revenge  is  balked  by  the 
removal  of  its  supposed  motive;  Vivian  having 
actually  married  MalgrS's  daughter,  and  being 
prepared  to  make  Jack  heir  of  Castlemere.  Moral: 
"'Vengeance  is  mine,'  saith  the  Lord,  'I  will 
repay.' " 

The  groundwork  of  the  story  was  now  suffi 
ciently  defined.  Madeleine  and  Jack  were  born 


Zb  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

and  accounted  for.  They  had  met  and  made 
friends  with  each  other  without  either  knowing 
who  the  other  was ;  they  were  rival  claimants  for 
the  same  property,  and  would  hereafter  contend 
for  it ;  still,  without  identifying  each  other  as  the 
little  boy  and  girl  that  had  met  by  chance  in  the 
cave  so  long  ago.  In  the  meanwhile,  there  might 
be  personal  meetings,  in  which  they  should  recog 
nize  each  other  as  persons  though  not  by  name ; 
and  should  thus  be  cementing  their  friendship  as 
man  and  woman,  while,  as  Jack  Vivian  and 
Madeleine,  they  were  at  open  war  in  the  courts 
of  law. 

This  arrangement  would  need  careful  handling 
to  render  it  plausible ;  but  it  could  be  done.  I  am 
now  of  opinion,  however,  that  I  should  have  done 
well  to  have  given  up  the  whole  fundamental  idea 
of  the  story,  as  suggested  by  the  dream.  The 
dream  had  done  its  office  when  it  had  provided  me 
with  characters  and  materials  for  a  more  probable 
and  less  abstruse  and  difficult  plot.  All  further 
dependence  upon  it  should  then  have  been  relin 
quished,  and  the  -story  allowed  to  work  out  its 
own  natural  and  unforced  conclusion.  But  it  is 
easy  to  be  wise  after  the  event ;  and  the  event,  at 
this  time,  was  still  in  the  future. 


A  PRELIMINARY  CONFESSION.  27 

As  Madeleine  was  to  be  the  opposite  of  the  sin 
less,  ideal  woman  that  Jack  was  to  imagine  her  to 
be,  it  was  necessary  to  subject  her  to  some  evil 
influence ;  and  this  influence  was  embodied  in  the 
form  of  Bryan  Sinclair,  who,  though  an  after 
thought,  came  to  be  the  most  powerful  figure  in 
the  story.  But,  before  he  would  bring  himself  to 
bear  upon  her,  she  must  have  reached  womanhood; 
and  I  also  perceived  that  Jack  must  become  a 
man  before  the  action  of  the  story,  as  between  him 
and  Madeleine,  could  continue.  An  interval  of 
ten  or  fifteen  years  must  therefore  occur ;  and  this 
was  arranged  by  sending  Jack  into  the  western 
wilderness  of  California,  and  fixing  the  period  as 
just  preceding  the  date  of  the  California  gold  fever 
of  '49. 

Jack  and  Bryan  were  to  be  rivals  for  Madeleine ; 
but  artistic  considerations  seemed  to  require  that 
they  should  first  meet  and  become  friends  much 
in  the  same  way  that  Jack  and  Madeleine  had 
done.  So  I  sent  Bryan  to  California,  and  made 
him  the  original  discoverer  of  the  precious 
metal  there ;  brought  him  and  Jack  together ; 
and  finally  sent  them  to  England  in  each  other's 
company.  Jack,  of  course,  as  yet  knows  nothing 
of  his  origin,  and  appears  in  London  society 


28  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

merely  as  a  natural  genius  and  a  sculptor  of  wild 
animals. 

By  this  time,  I  had  begun  to  make  Madeleine's 
acquaintance,  and,  in  consequence,  to  doubt  the 
possibility  of  her  becoming  wholly  evil,  even  under 
the  influence  of  Bryan  Sinclair.  There  would  be 
a  constant  struggle  between  them ;  she  would  love 
him,  but  would  not  yield  to  him,  though  her  life 
and  happiness  would  be  compromised  by  his 
means.  He,  on  the  other  hand,  would  love  her, 
and  he  would  make  some  effort  to  be  worthy  of 
her ;  but  his  other  crimes  would  weigh  him  down, 
until,  at  the  moment  when  the  battle  cost  her  her 
life,  he  should  be  destroyed  by  the  incarnation  of 
his  own  wickedness,  in  the  shape  of  Tom  Berne. 

This  was  not  the  issue  that  I  had  originally  de 
signed,  and,  whether  better  or  worse  than  that, 
did  not  harmonize  with  what  had  gone  before. 
The  story  lacked  wholeness  and  continuous  vital 
ity.  As  a  work  of  art,  it  was  a  failure.  But  I 
did  not  realize  this  fact  until  it  was  too  late,  and 
probably  should  not  have  known  how  to  mend 
matters  had  it  been  otherwise.  One  of  the  dan 
gers  against  which  a  writer  has  especially  to  guard 
is  that  of  losing  his  sense  of  proportion  in  the 
conduct  of  a  story.  An  episode  that  has  little 


A  PRELIMINARY  CONFESSION.  29 

relative  importance  may  be  allowed  undue  weight, 
because  it  seems  interesting  intrinsically,  or  be 
cause  he  has  expended  special  pains  upon  it.  It 
is  only  long  afterward,  when  he  has  become  cool 
and  impartial,  if  not  indifferent  or  disgusted,  that 
he  can  see  clearly  where  the  faults  of  construction 
lie.  ' 

I  need  not  go  further  into  the  details  of  the 
story.  Enough  has  been  said  to  give  a  clew  to 
what  might  remain  to  say.  I  began  to  write  it  in 
the  winter  of  1879-80,  in  London ;  and,  in  order  to 
avoid  noise  and  interruption,  it  was  my  custom  to 
begin  writing  at  eight  in  the  evening,  and  con 
tinue  at  work  until  six  or  seven  o'clock  the  next 
morning.  In  three  months  I  had  written  as  far  as 
the  393d  page,  in  the  American  edition.  The  re 
maining  seventy  pages  were  not  completed,  in 
their  published  form,  until  about  three  years  later, 
an  extraordinary  delay,  which  did  not  escape  cen 
sure  at  the  time,  and  into  the  causes  of  which  I 
will  not  enter  here. 

The  title  of  the  story  also .  underwent  various 
vicissitudes.  The  one  first  chosen  was  "Happy 
Jack  ";  but  that  was  objected  to  as  suggesting,  to 
an  English  ear  at  least,  a  species  of  cheap  Jack  or 
rambling  peddler.  The  next  title  fixed  upon  was 


30  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

"Luck";  but  before  this  could  be  copyrighted, 
somebody  published  a  story  called  "Luck,  and 
What  Came  of  It,"  and  thereby  invalidated  my 
briefer  version.  For  several  weeks,  I  was  at  a  loss 
what  to  call  it ;  but  one  evening,  at  a  representa 
tion  of  "  Romeo  and  Juliet,"  I  heard  the  exclama 
tion  of  Romeo,  "  Oh,  I  am  fortune's  fool ! "  and 
immediately  appropriated  it  to  my  own  needs.  It 
suited  the  book  well  enough,  in  more  ways  than 
one. 


CHAPTER  II. 

NOVELS  AND  AGNOSTICISM. 

THE  novel  of  our  times  is  susceptible  of  many 
definitions.  The  American  publishers  of  Railway 
libraries  think  that  it  is  forty  or  fifty  double- 
column  pages  of  pirated  English  fiction.  Readers 
of  the  "New  York  Ledger"  suppose  it  to  be  a 
romance  of  angelic  virtue  at  last  triumphant  over 
satanic  villany.  The  aristocracy  of  culture  de 
scribe  it  as  a  philosophic  analysis  of  human  char 
acter  and  motives,  with  an  agnostic  bias  on  the 
analyst's  part.  Schoolboys  are  under  the  impres 
sion  that  it  is  a  tale  of  Western  chivalry  and  In 
dian  outrage  —  price,  ten  cents.  Most  of  us  agree 
in  the  belief  that  it  should  contain  a  brace  or  two 
of  lovers,  a  suspense,  and  a  solution. 

To  investigate  the  nature  of  the  novel  in  the 
abstract  would  involve  going  back  to  the  very 
origin  of  things.  It  would  imply  the  recognition 
of  a  certain  faculty  of  the  mind,  known  as  imagi 
nation  ;  and  of  a  certain  fact  in  history,  called  art. 

31 


32  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

Art  and  imagination  are  correlatives,  —  one  im 
plies  the  other.  Together,  they  may  be  said  to 
constitute  the  characteristic  badge  and  vindication 
of  human  nature ;  imagination  is  the  badge,  and 
art  is  the  vindication.  Reason,  which  gets  so  much 
vulgar  glorification,  is,  after  all,  a  secondary  qual 
ity.  It  is  posterior  to  imagination,  —  it  is  one  of 
the  means  by  which  imagination  seeks  to  realize 
its  ends.  Some  animals  reason,  or  seem  to  do  so : 
but  the  most  cultivated  ape  or  donkey  has  not  yet 
composed  a  sonnet,  or  a  symphony,  or  "an  ar 
rangement  in  green  and  yellow."  Man  still  re 
tains  a  few  prerogatives,  although,  like.  JEsop's 
stag,  which  despised  the  legs  that  bore  it  away 
from  the  hounds,  and  extolled  the  antlers  that 
entangled  it  in  the  thicket,  —  so  man  often  mag 
nifies  those  elements  of  his  nature  that  least  de 
serve  it. 

But,  before  celebrating  art  and  imagination,  we 
should  have  a  clear  idea  what  those  handsome 
terms  mean.  In  the  broadest  sense,  imagination 
is  the  cause  of  the  effect  we  call  progress.  It 
marks  all  forms  of  human  effort  towards  a  better 
state  of  things.  It  embraces  a  perception  of  exist 
ing  shortcomings,  and  an  aspiration  towards  a 
loftier  ideal.  It  is,  in  fact,  a  truly  divine  force 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM.  33 

in  man,  reminding  him  of  his  heavenly  origin,  and 
stimulating  him  to  rise  again  to  the  level  whence 
he  fell.  For  it  has  glimpses  of  the  divine  Image 
within  or  behind  the  material  veil ;  and  its  con 
stant  impulse  is  to  tear  aside  the  veil  and  grasp 
the  image.  The  world,  let  us  say,  is  a  gross  and 
finite  translation  of  an  infinite  and  perfect  Word; 
and  imagination  is  the  intuition  of  that  perfection, 
born  in  the  human  heart,  and  destined  forever  to 
draw  mankind  into  closer  harmony  with  it. 

In  common  speech,  however,  imagination  is  de 
prived  of  this  broader  significance,  and  is  restricted 
to  its  relations  with  art.  Art  is  not  progress, 
though  progress  implies  art.  It  differs  from  pro 
gress  chiefly  in  disclaiming  the  practical  element. 
You  cannot  apply  a  poem,  a  picture,  or  a  strain  of 
music,  to  material  necessities ;  they  are  not  food, 
clothing,  or  shelter.  Only  after  these  physical 
wants  are  assuaged,  does  art  supervene.  Its  sphere 
is  exclusively  mental  and  moral.  But  this  defini 
tion  is  not  adequate;  a  further  distinction  is 
needed.  For  such  things  as  mathematics,  moral 
philosophy,  and  political  economy  also  belong  to 
the  mental  sphere,  and  yet  they  are  not  art.  But 
these,  though  not  actually  existing  on  the  plane 
of  material  necessities,  yet  do  exist  solely  in  order 


34  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

to  relieve  such  necessities.  Unlike  beauty,  they 
are  not  their  own  excuse  for  being.  Their  em 
bodiment  is  utilitarian,  that  of  art  is  aesthetic. 
Political  economy,  for  example,  shows  me  how  to 
buy  two  drinks  for  the  same  price  I  used  to  pay 
for  one ;  while  art  inspires  me  to  transmute  a 
pewter  mug  into  a  Cellini  goblet.  My  physical 
nature,  perhaps,  prefers  two  drinks  to  one ;  but,  if 
my  taste  be  educated,  and  I  be  not  too  thirsty,  I 
would  rather  drink  once  from  the  Cellini  goblet 
than  twice  from  the  mug.  Political  economy 
gravitates  towards  the  material  level ;  art  seeks 
incarnation  only  in  order  to  stimulate  anew  the 
same  spiritual  faculties  that  generated  it.  Art  is 
the  production,  by  means  of  appearances,  of  the 
illusion  of  a  loftier  reality ;  and  imagination  is  the 
faculty  which  holds  that  loftier  reality  up  for  imi 
tation. 

The  disposition  of  these  preliminaries  brings  us 
once  more  in  sight  of  the  goal  of  our  pilgrimage. 
The  novel,  despite  its  name,  is  no  new  thing,  but 
an  old  friend  in  a  modern  dress.  Ever  since  the 
time  of  Cadmus,  —  ever  since  language  began  to 
express  thought  as  well  as  emotion,  —  men  have 
betrayed  the  impulse  to  utter  in  forms  of  literary 
art,  —  in  poetry  and  story,  —  their  conceptions  of 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM.  35 

the  world  around  them.  According  to  many  phil 
ologists,  poetry  was  the  original  form  of  human 
speech.  Be  that  as  it  may,  whatever  flows  into 
the  mind,  from  the  spectacle  of  nature  and  of 
mankind,  that  influx  the  mind  tends  instinctively 
to  reproduce,  in  a  shape  accordant  with  its  pecul 
iar  bias  and  genius.  And  those  minds  in  which 
imagination  is  predominant,  impart  to  their  repro 
ductions  a  balance  and  beauty  which  stamp  them 
as  art.  Art  —  and  literary  art  especially  —  is 
the  only  evidence  we  have  that  this  universal 
frame  of  things  has  relation  to  our  minds,  and  is  a 
universe  and  not  a  poliverse.  Outside  revelation, 
it  is  our  best  assurance  of  an  intelligent  purpose 
in  creation. 

Novels,  then,  instead  of  being  (as  some  persons 
have  supposed)  a  wilful  and  corrupt  conspiracy 
on  the  part  of  the  evilly  disposed,  against  the  peace 
and  prosperity  of  the  realm,  may  claim  a  most  an 
cient  and  indefeasible  right  to  existence.  They, 
with  their  ancestors  and  near  relatives,  constitute 
Literature, —  without  which  the  human  race  would 
be  little  better  than  savages.  For  the  effect  of 
pure  literature  upon  a  receptive  mind  is  some 
thing  more  than  can  be  definitely  stated.  Like 
sunshine  upon  a  landscape,  it  is  a  kind  of  miracle. 


36  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

It  demands  from  its  disciple  almost  as  much,  as  it 
gives  him,  and  is  never  revealed  save  to  the  disin 
terested  and  loving  eye.  In  our  best  moments,  it 
touches  us  most  deeply ;  and  when  the  sentiment 
of  human  brotherhood  kindles  most  warmly  within 
us,  we  discover  in  literature  an  exquisite  answer 
ing  ardor.  When  everything  that  can  be,  has  been 
said  about  a  true  work  of  art,  its  finest  charm  re 
mains, —  the  charm  derived  from  a  source  beyond 
the  conscious  reach  even  of  the  artist. 

The  novel,  then,  must  be  pure  literature;  as 
much  so  as  the  poem.  But  poetry  —  now  that  the 
day  of  the  broad  Homeric  epic  is  past,  or  tempo 
rarily  eclipsed  —  appeals  to  a  taste  too  exclusive 
and  abstracted  for  the  demands  of  modern  readers. 
Its  most  accommodating  metre  fails  to  house  our 
endless  variety  of  mood  and  movement ;  it  exacts 
from  the  student  an  exaltation  above  the  custom 
ary  level  of  thought  and  sentiment  greater  than  he 
can  readily  afford.  The  poet  of  old  used  to  clothe 
in  the  garb  of  verse  his  every  observation  on  life 
and  nature ;  but  to-day  he  reserves  for  it  only  his 
most  ideal  and  abstract  conceptions.  The  merit  of 
Cervantes  is  not  so  much  that  he  laughed  Spain's 
chivalry  away,  as  that  he  heralded  the  modern 
novel  of  character  arid  manners.  It  is  the  latest, 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM.  37 

most  pliable,  most  catholic  solution  of  the  old 
problem,  —  how  to  unfold  man  to  himself.  It  im 
proves  on  the  old  methods,  while  missing  little  of 
their  excellence.  No  one  can  read  a  great  novel 
without  feeling  that,  from  its  outwardly  prosaic 
pages,  strains  of  genuine  poetry  have  ever  and 
anon  reached  his  ears.  It  does  not  obtrude  itself ; 
it  is  not  there  for  him  who  has  not  skill  to  listen 
for  it:  but  for  him  who  has  ears,  it  is  like  the 
music  of  a  bird,  defining  itself  amidst  the  innu 
merable  murmurs  of  the  forest. 

So,  the  ideal  novel,  conforming  in  every  part  to 
the  behests  of  the  imagination,  should  produce,  by 
means  of  literary  art,  the  illusion  of  a  loftier  real 
ity.  This  excludes  the  photographic  method  of 
novel- writing.  "That  is  a  false  effort  in  art," 
says  Goethe,  towards  the  close  of  his  long  and 
splendid  career,  "which,  in  giving  reality  to  the 
appearance,  goes  so  far  as  to  leave  in  it  nothing 
but  the  common,  every-day  actual."  It  is  neither 
the  actual,  nor  Chinese  copies  of  the  actual,  that 
we  demand  of  art.  Were  art  merely  the  purveyor 
of  such  things,  she  might  yield  her  crown  to  the 
camera  and  the  stenographer ;  and  divine  imagina 
tion  would  degenerate  into  vulgar  inventiveness. 
Imagination  is  incompatible  with  inventiveness,  or 


38  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

imitation.  Imitation  is  death,  imagination  is  life. 
Imitation  is  servitude,  imagination  is  royalty.  He 
who  claims  the  name  of  artist  must  rise  to  that 
vision  of  a  loftier  reality  —  a  more  true  because  a 
more  beautiful  world  — which  only  imagination 
can  reveal.  A  truer  world, — for  the  world  of 
facts  is  not  and  cannot  be  true.  It  is  barren,  in 
coherent,  misleading.  But  behind  every  fact  there 
is  a  truth :  and  these  truths  are  enlightening,  uni 
fying,  creative.  Fasten  your  hold  upon  them,  and 
facts  will  become  your  servants  instead  of  your 
tyrants.  No  charm  of  detail  will  be  lost,  no  home 
ly  picturesque  circumstance,  no  touch  of  human 
pathos  or  humor;  but  all  hardness,  rigidity,  and 
finality  will  disappear,  and  your  story  will  be  not 
yours  alone,  but  that  of  every  one  who  feels  and 
thinks.  Spirit  gives  universality  and  meaning; 
but  alas !  for  this  new  gospel  of  the  auctioneer's 
catalogue,  and  the  crackling  of  thorns  under  a 
pot.  He  who  deals  with  facts  only,  deprives  his 
work  of  gradation  and  distinction.  One  fact,  con 
sidered  in  itself,  has  no  less  importance  than  any 
other ;  a  lump  of  charcoal  is  as  valuable  as  a  dia 
mond.  But  that  is  the  philosophy  of  brute  beasts 
and  Digger  Indians.  A  child,  digging  on  the 
beach,  may  shape  a  heap  of  sand  into  a  similitude 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM.  39 

of  Vesuvius  ;  but  is  it  nothing  that  Vesuvius  tow 
ers  above  the  clouds,  and  overwhelms  Pompeii  ? 

In  proceeding  from  the  general  to  the  particular, 
— to  the  novel  as  it  actually  exists  in  England  and 
'America, — attention  will  be  confined  strictly  to 
the  contemporary  outlook.  The  new  generation 
of  novelists  (by  which  is  intended  not  those  merely 
living  in  this  age,  but  those  who  actively  belong 
to  it)  differ  in  at  least  one  fundamental  respect 
from  the  later  representatives  of  the  generation 
preceding  them.  Thackeray  and  Dickens  did  not 
deliberately  concern  themselves  about  a  philoso 
phy  of  life.  With  more  or  less  complacency, 
more  or  less  cynicism,  they  accepted  the  religious 
and  social  canons  which  had  grown  to  be  the 
commonplace  of  the  first  half  of  this  century. 
They  pictured  men  and  women,  not  as  affected  by 
questions,  but  as  affected  by  one  another.  The 
morality  and  immorality  of  their  personages  were 
of  the  old  familiar  Church-of-England  sort ;  there 
was  no  speculation  as  to  whether  what  had  been 
supposed  to  be  wrong  was  really  right,  and  vice 
versd.  Such  speculations,  in  various  forms  and 
degrees  of  energy,  appear  in  the  world  periodi 
cally;  but  the  public  conscience  during  the  last 


40  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

thirty  or  forty  years  had  been  gradually  making 
itself  comfortable  after  the  disturbances  conse 
quent  upon  the  French  Revolution ;  the  theoretical 
rights  of  man  had  been  settled  for  the  moment ; 
and  interest  was  directed  no  longer  to  the  asser 
tion  and  support  of  these  rights,  but  to  the  social 
condition  and  character  which  were  their  out 
come.  Good  people  were  those  who  climbed 
through  reverses  and  sorrows  towards  the  conven 
tional  heaven;  bad  people  were  those  who,  in 
spite  of  worldly  and  temporary  successes  and  tri 
umphs,  gravitated  towards  the  conventional  hell. 
Novels  designed  on  this  basis  in  so  far  filled  the 
bill,  as  the  phrase  is :  their  greater  or  less  excel 
lence  depended  solely  on  the  veracity  with  which 
the  aspect,  the  temperament,  and  the  conduct  of 
the  dramatis  personce  were  reported,  and  upon  the 
amount  of  ingenuity  wherewith  the  web  of  events 
and  circumstances  was  woven,  and  the  conclusion 
reached.  Nothing  more  was  expected,  and,  in  gen 
eral,  little  or  nothing  more  was  attempted.  Little 
more,  certainly,  will  be  found  in  the  writings 
of  Thackeray  or  of  Balzac,  who,  it  is  commonly 
admitted,  approach  nearest  to  perfection  of  any 
novelists  of  their  time.  There  was  nothing  gen 
uine  or  commanding  in  the  metaphysical  dilettan- 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM:.  41 

teism  of  Bulwer :  the  philosophical  speculations  of 
Georges  Sand  are  the  least  permanently  interest 
ing  feature  of  her  writings ;  and  the  same  might  in 
some  measure  be  affirmed  of  George  Eliot,  whose 
gloomy  wisdom  finally  confesses  its  inability  to  do 
more  than  advise  us  rather  to  bear  those  ills  we 
have  than  fly  to  others  that  we  know  not  of.     As 
to  Nathaniel  Hawthorne,  he  cannot  properly  be  in 
stanced  in  this  connection ;  for  he  analyzed  chiefly 
those  parts  of  human  nature  which  remain  substan 
tially  unaltered  in  the  face  of  whatever  changes  of 
opinion,  civilization,  and  religion.     The  truth  that 
he  brings  to  light  is  not  the  sensational  fact  of  a 
fashion  or  a  period,  but  a  verity  of   the  human 
heart,  which  may  foretell,  but  can  never  be  affected 
by,  anything  which  that  heart  may  conceive.     In 
other  words,  Hawthorne  belonged  neither  to  this 
nor  to  any  other  generation  of   writers   further 
than  that  his  productions  may  be  used  as  a  test 
of  the  inner  veracity  of  all  the  rest. 

But  of  late  years  a  new  order  of  things  has  been 
coming  into  vogue,  and  the  new  novelists  have 
been  among  the  first  to  reflect  it ;  and  of  these  the 
Americans  have  shown  themselves  among  the 
most  susceptible.  Science,  or  the  investigation  of 
the  phenomena  of  existence  (in  opposition  to  phil- 


42  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

osophy,  the  investigation  of  the  phenomena  of 
being),  has  proved  nature  to  be  so  orderly  and 
self-sufficient,  and  inquiry  as  to  the  origin  of  the 
primordial  atom  so  unproductive  and  quixotic,  as 
to  make  it  convenient  and  indeed  reasonable  to 
accept  nature  as  a  self-existing  fact,  and  to  let  all 
the  rest  —  if  rest  there  be  —  go.  From  this  point 
of  view,  God  and  a  future  life  retire  into  the  back 
ground;  not  as  finally  disproved,— because  denial, 
like  affirmation,  must,  in  order  to  be  final,  be  logi 
cally  supported ;  and  spirit  is,  if  not  illogical,  at 
any  rate  outside  the  domain  of  logic, — but  as  being 
a  hopelessly  vague  and  untrustworthy  hypothesis. 
The  Bible  is  a  human  book ;  Christ  was  a  gentle 
man,  related  to  the  Buddha  and  Plato  families ; 
Joseph  was  an  ill-used  man ;  death,  so  far  as  we 
have  any  reason  to  believe,  is  annihilation  of  per 
sonal  existence;  life  is  —  the  predicament  of  the 
body  previous  to  death;  morality  is  the  enlight 
ened  selfishness  of  the  greatest  number ;  civiliza 
tion  is  the  compromises  men  make  with  one  another 
in  order  to  get  the  most  they  can  out  of  the  world ; 
wisdom  is  acknowledgment  of  these  propositions ; 
folly  is  to  hanker  after  what  may  lie  beyond  the 
sphere  of  sense.  The  supporter  of  these  doctrines 
by  no  means  permits  himself  to  be  regarded  as  a 


NOVELS  AND  AGNOSTICISM.  43 

rampant  and  dogmatic  atheist ;  he  is  simply  the 
modest  and  humble  doubter  of  what  he  cannot 
prove.  He  even  recognizes  the  persistence  of  the 
religious  instinct  in  man,  and  caters  to  it  by  a 
new  religion  suited  to  the  times  —  the  Religion  of 
Humanity.  Thus  he  is  secure  at  all  points :  for  if 
the  religion  of  the  Bible  turn  out  to  be  true,  his 
disappointment  will  be  an  agreeable  one  ;  and  if  it 
turns  out  false,  he  will  not  be  disappointed  at  all. 
He  is  an  agnostic  —  a  person  bound  to  be  com 
placent  whatever  happens.  He  may  indulge  a 
gentle  regret,  a  musing  sadness,  a  smiling  pensive- 
ness  ;  but  he  will  never  refuse  a  comfortable  din 
ner,  and  always  wear  something  soft  next  his  skin, 
nor  can  he  altogether  avoid  the  consciousness  of 
his  intellectual  superiority. 

Agnosticism,  which  reaches  forward  into  nihil 
ism  on  one  side,  and  extends  back  into  liberal 
Christianity  on  the  other,  marks,  at  all  events,  a 
definite  turning-point  from  what  has  been  to  what 
is  to  come.  The  human  mind,  in  the  course  of 
its  long  journey,  is  passing  through  a  dark  place, 
and  is,  as  it  were,  whistling  to  keep  up  its  cour 
age.  It  is  a  period  of  doubt :  what  it  will  result 
in  remains  to  be  seen ;  but  analogy  leads  us  to 
infer  that  this  doubt,  like  all  others,  will  be  sue- 


44  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

ceeded  by  a  comparatively  definite  belief  in  some 
thing  —  no  matter  what.  It  is  a  transient  state 
—  the  interval  between  one  creed  and  another. 
The  agnostic  no  longer  holds  to  what  is  behind 
him,  nor  knows  what  lies  before,  so  he  contents 
himself  with  feeling  the  ground  beneath  his  feet. 
That,  at  least,  though  the  heavens  fall,  is  likely 
to  remain ;  meanwhile,  let  the  heavens  take  care 
of  themselves.  It  may  be  the  part  of  valor  to 
champion  divine  revelation,  but  the  better  part 
of  valor  is  discretion,  and  if  divine  revelation 
prove  true,  discretion  will  be  none  the  worse  off. 
On  the  other  hand,  to  champion  a  myth  is  to 
make  one's  self  ridiculous,  and  of  being  ridicu 
lous  the  agnostic  has  a  consuming  fear.  From 
the  superhuman  disinterestedness  of  the  theory 
of  the  Religion  of  Humanity,  before  which  angels 
might  quail,  he  flinches  not,  but  when  it  comes  to 
the  risk  of  being  laughed  at  by  certain  sagacious 
persons  he  confesses  that  bravery  has  its  limits. 
He  dares  do  all  that  may  become  an  agnostic,  — 
who  dares  do  more  is  none. 

But,  however  open  to  criticism  this  phase  of 
thought  may  be,  it  is  a  genuine  phase,  and  the 
proof  is  the  alarm  and  the  shifts  that  it  has 
brought  about  in  the  opposite  camp.  "Estab- 


NOVELS  AND  AGNOSTICISM.  45 

lished"  religion  finds  the  foundation  of  her  es 
tablishment  undermined,  and,  like  the  lady  in 
Hamlet's  play,  she  doth  protest  too  much.  In 
another  place,  all  manner  of  odd  superstitions 
and  quasi-miracles  are  cropping  up  and  gaming 
credence,  as  if,  since  the  immortality  of  the  soul 
cannot  be  proved  by  logic,  it  should  be  smuggled 
into  belief  by  fraud  and  violence  —  that  is,  by 
the  testimony  of  the  bodily  senses  themselves. 
Taking  a  comprehensive  view  of  the  whole  field, 
therefore,  it  seems  to  be  divided  between  discreet 
and  supercilious  skepticism  on  one  side,  and,  on 
the  other,  the  clamorous  jugglery  of  charlatanism. 
The  case  is  not  really  so  bad  as  that :  nihilists  are 
not  discreet  and  even  the  Bishop  of  Home  is  not 
necessarily  a  charlatan.  Nevertheless,  the  out 
look  may  fairly  be  described  as  confused  and  the 
issue  uncertain.  And  —  to  come  without  further 
preface  to  the  subject  of  this  paper  —  it  is  with 
this  material  that  the  modern  novelist,  so  far  as 
he  is  a  modern  and  not  a  future  novelist,  or  a 
novelist  temporis  acti,  has  to  work.  Unless  a 
man  have  the  gift  to  forecast  the  years,  or,  at 
least,  to  catch  the  first  ray  of  the  coming  light, 
he  can  hardly  do  better  than  attend  to  what  is 
under  his  nose.  He  may  hesitate  to  identify  him- 


46  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

self  with  agnosticism,  but  he  can  scarcely  avoid 
discussing  it,  either  in  itself  or  in  its  effects.  He 
entertain  its  problems ;  and  the  personages 
of  his  story,  if  they  do  not  directly  advocate  or 
oppose  agnostic  views,  must  show  in  their  lives 
either  confirmation  or  disproof  of  agnostic  prin 
ciples.  It  is  impossible,  save  at  the  cost  of  affec 
tation  or  of  ignorance,  to  escape  from  the  spirit 
of  the  age.  It  is  in  the  air  we  breathe,  and, 
whether  we  are  fully  conscious  thereof  or  not, 
our  lives  and  thoughts  must  needs  be  tinctured 
by  it. 

Now,  art  is  creative;  but  Mephistopheles,  the 
spirit  that  denies,  is  destructive.  A  negative  atti 
tude  of  mind  is  not  favorable  for  the  production 
of  works  of  art.  The  best  periods  of  art  have  also 
been  periods  of  spiritual  or  philosophical  convic 
tions.  The  more  a  man  doubts,  the  more  he  disin 
tegrates  and  the  less  he  constructs.  He  has  in 
him  no  central  initial  certainty  round  which  all 
other  matters  of  knowledge  or  investigation  may 
group  themselves  in  symmetrical  relation.  He  may 
analyze  to  his  heart's  content,  but  must  be  wary 
of  organizing.  If  creation  is  not  of  God,  if  nature 
is  not  the  expression  of  the  contact  between  an 
infinite  and  a  finite  being,  then  the  universe  and 


NOVELS   AND  AGNOSTICISM.  47 

everything  in  it  are  accidents,  which  might  have 
been  otherwise  or  might  have  not  been  at  all ; 
there  is  no  design  in  them  nor  purpose,  no  divine 
and  eternal  significance.  This  being  conceded, 
what  meaning  would  there  be  in  designing  works 
of  art  ?  If  art  has  not  its  prototype  in  creation,  if 
all  that  we  see  and  do  is  chance,  uninspired  by  a 
controlling  and  forming  intelligence  behind  or 
within  it,  then  to  construct  a  work  of  art  would 
be  to  make  something  arbitrary  and  grotesque, 
something  unreal  and  fugitive,  something  out  of 
accord  with  the  general  sense  (or  nonsense)  of 
things,  something  with  no  further  basis  or  warrant 
than  is  supplied  by  the  maker's  idle  and  irrespon 
sible  fancy.  But  since  no  man  cares  to  expend 
the  trained  energies  of  his  mind  upon  the  manu 
facture  of  toys,  it  will  come  to  pass  (upon  the 
accidental  hypothesis  of  creation)  that  artists  will 
become  shy  of  justifying  their  own  title.  They 
will  adopt  the  scientific  method  of  merely  collect 
ing  and  describing  phenomena;  but  the  phe 
nomena  will  no  longer  be  arranged  as  parts  or 
developments  of  a  central  controlling  idea,  be 
cause  such  an  arrangement  would  no  longer  seem 
to  be  founded  on  the  truth :  the  gratification 
which  it  gives  to  the  mind  would  be  deemed  illu- 


48  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

sory,  the  result  of  tradition  and  prejudice;  or,  in 
other  words,  what  is  true  being  found  no  longer 
consistent  with  what  we  have  been  accustomed  to 
call  beauty,  the  latter  would  cease  to  be  an  object 
of  desire,  though  something  widely  alien  to  it 
might  usurp  its  name.  If  beauty  be  devoid  of 
independent  right  to  be,  and  definable  only  as  an 
attribute  of  truth,  then  undoubtedly  the  cynosure 
to-day  may  be  the  scarecrow  of  to-morrow,  and 
vice  versd,  according  to  our  varying  conception  of 
what  truth  is. 

And,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  art  already  shows  the 
effects  of  the  agnostic  influence.  Artists  have  be 
gun  to  doubt  whether  their  old  conceptions  of 
beauty  be  not  fanciful  and  silly.  They  betray  a 
tendency  to  eschew  the  loftier  flights  of  the  imag 
ination,  and  confine  themselves  to  what  they  call 
facts.  Critics  deprecate  idealism  as  something  fit 
only  for  children,  and  extol  the  courage  of  seeing 
and  representing  things  as  they  are.  Sculpture  is 
either  a  stern  student  of  modern  trousers  and 
coat-tails  or  a  vapid  imitator  of  classic  prototypes. 
Painters  try  all  manner  of  experiments,  and  shrink 
from  painting  beneath  the  surface  of  their  canvas. 
Much  of  recent  effort  in  the  different  branches  of 
art  comes  to  us  in  the  form  of  "  studies,"  but  the 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM.  49 

complete  work  still  delays  to  be  born.  We  would 
not  so  much  mind  having  our  old  idols  and  crite- 
rions  done  away  with  were  something  new  and 
better,  or  as  good,  substituted  for  them.  But  ap 
parently  nothing  definite  has  yet  been  decided  on. 
Doubt  still  reigns,  and,  once  more,  doubt  is  not 
creative.  One  of  two  things  must  presently  hap 
pen.  The  time  will  come  when  we  must  stop 
saying  that  we  do  not  know  whether  or  not  God, 
and  all  that  God  implies,  exists,  and  affirm  defi 
nitely  and  finally  either  that  he  does  not  exist  or 
that  he  does.  That  settled,  we  shall  soon  see 
what  will  become  of  art.  If  there  is  a  God,  he 
will  be  understood  and  worshipped,  not  super- 
stitiously  and  literally  as  heretofore,  but  in  a  new 
and  enlightened  spirit;  and  an  art  will  arise  com 
mensurate  with  this  new  and  loftier  revelation. 
If  there  is  no  God,  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  art  can 
have  the  face  to  show  herself  any  more.  There  is 
no  place  for  her  in  the  Religion  of  Humanity ;  to 
be  true  and  living  she  can  be  nothing  which  it  has 
thus  far  entered  into  the  heart  of  man  to  call 
beautiful ;  and  she  could  only  serve  to  remind  us 
of  certain  vague  longings  and  aspirations  now 
proved  to  be  as  false  as  they  were  vain.  Art  is 
not  an  orchid :  it  cannot  grow  in  the  air.  Unless 


50  CONFESSIONS   AND    CRITICISMS. 

its  root  can  be  traced  as  deep  down  as  Yggdrasil, 
it  will  wither  and  vanish,  and  be  forgotten  as  it 
ought  to  be ;  and  as  for  the  cowslip  by  the  river's 
brim,  a  yellow  cowslip  it  shall  be,  and  nothing 
more ;  and  the  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land 
shall  be  permanently  extinguished,  in  the  interests 
of  common  sense  and  economy,  and  (what  is  least 
inviting  of  all  to  the  unregenerate  mind)  we  shall 
speedily  get  rid  of  the  notion  that  we  have  lost 
anything  worth  preserving. 

This,  however,  is  only  what  may  be,  and  our 
concern  at  present  is  with  things  as  they  are.  It 
has  been  observed  that  American  writers  have 
shown  themselves  more  susceptible  of  the  new  in 
fluences  than  most  others,  partly  no  doubt  from  a 
natural  sensitiveness  of  organization,  but  in  some 
measure  also  because  there  are  with  us  no  ruts 
and  fetters  of  old  tradition  from  which  we  must 
emancipate  ourselves  before  adopting  anything 
new.  We  have  no  past,  in  the  European  sense, 
and  so  are  ready  for  whatever  the  present  or  the 
future  may  have  to  suggest.  Nevertheless,  the 
novelist  who,  in  a  larger  degree  than  any  other, 
seems  to  be  the  literary  parent  of  our  own  best 
men  of  fiction,  is  himself  not  an  American,  nor 
even  an  Englishman,  but  a  Russian  —  Turgud- 


NOVELS  AND  AGNOSTICISM.  51 

nieff.  His  series  of  extraordinary  novels,  trans 
lated  into  English  and  French,  is  altogether  the 
most  important  fact  in  the  literature  of  fiction  of 
the  last  twelve  years.  To  read  his  books  you 
would  scarcely  imagine  that  their  author  could 
have  had  any  knowledge  of  the  work  of  his  prede 
cessors  in  the  same  field.  Originality  is  a  term 
indiscriminately  applied,  and  generally  of  trifling 
significance,  but  so  far  as  any  writer  may  be  orig 
inal,  Turgudnieff  is  so.  He  is  no  less  original  in 
the  general  scheme  and  treatment  of  his  stories 
than  in  their  details.  Whatever  he  produces  has 
the  air  of  being  the  outcome  of  his  personal  expe 
rience  and  observation.  He  even  describes  his 
characters,  their  aspect,  features,  and  ruling  traits, 
in  a  novel  and  memorable  manner.  He  seizes  on 
them  from  a  new  point  of  vantage,  and  uses 
scarcely  any  of  the  hackneyed  and  conventional 
devices  for  bringing  his  portraits  before  our 
minds;  yet  no  writer,  not  even  Carlyle,  has  been 
more  vivid,  graphic,  and  illuminating  than  he. 
Here  are  eyes  that  owe  nothing  to  other  eyes,  but 
examine  and  record  for  themselves.  Having  once 
taken  up  a  character  he  never  loses  his  grasp  on 
it:  on  the  contrary,  he  masters  it  more  and  more, 
and  only  lets  go  of  it  when  the  last  recesses  of  its 


52  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

organism  have  been  explored.  In  the  quality  and 
conduct  of  his  plots  he  is  equally  unprecedented. 
His  scenes  are  modern,  and  embody  characteristic 
events  and  problems  in  the  recent  history  of  Rus 
sia.  There  is  in  their  arrangement  no  attempt  at 
symmetry,  nor  poetic  justice.  Temperament  and 
circumstances  are  made  to  rule,  and  against  their 
merciless  fiat  no  appeal  is  allowed.  Evil  does  evil 
to  the  end ;  weakness  never  gathers  strength ; 
even  goodness  never  varies  from  its  level :  it  suf 
fers,  but  is  not  corrupted ;  it  is  the  goodness  of 
instinct,  not  of  struggle  and  aspiration;  it  hap 
pens  to  belong  to  this  or  that  person,  just  as  his 
hair  happens  to  be  black  or  brown.  Everything 
in  the  surroundings  and  the  action  is  to  the  last 
degree  matter-of-fact,  commonplace,  inevitable ; 
there  are  no  picturesque  coincidences,  no  provi 
dential  interferences,  no  desperate  victories  over 
fate ;  the  tale,  like  the  world  of  the  materialist, 
moves  onward  from  a  predetermined  beginning  to 
a  helpless  and  tragic  close.  And  yet  few  books 
have  been  written  of  deeper  and  more  permanent 
fascination  than  these.  Their  grim  veracity ;  the 
creative  sympathy  and  steady  dispassionateness  of 
their  portrayal  of  mankind;  their  constancy  of 
motive,  and  their  sombre  earnestness,  have  been 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM.  53 

surpassed  by  none.  This  earnestness  is  worth 
dwelling  upon  for  a  moment.  It  bears  no  likeness 
to  the  dogmatism  of  the  bigot  or  the  fanaticism 
of  the  enthusiast.  It  is  the  concentration  of  a 
broadly  gifted  masculine  mind,  devoting  its  un 
stinted  energies  to  depicting  certain  aspects  of 
society  and  civilization,  which  are  powerfully  rep 
resentative  of  the  tendencies  of  the  day.  "  Here 
is  the  unvarnished  fact  —  give  heed  to  it!"  is  the 
unwritten  motto.  The  author  avoids  betraying, 
either  explicitly  or  implicitly,  the  tendency  of  his 
own  sympathies ;  not  because  he  fears  to  have 
them  known,  but  because  he  holds  it  to  be  his 
office  simply  to  portray,  and  to  leave  judgment 
thereupon  where,  in  any  case,  it  must  ultimately 
rest  —  with  the  world  of  his  readers.  He  tells  us 
what  is ;  it  is  for  us  to  consider  whether  it  also 
must  be  and  shall  be.  Turguenieff  is  an  artist  by 
nature,  yet  his  books  are  not  intentionally  works 
of  art;  they  are  fragments  of  history,  differing 
from  real  life  only  in  presenting  such  persons  and 
events  as  are  commandingly  and  exhaustively 
typical,  and  excluding  all  others.  This  faculty  of 
selection  is  one  of  the  highest  artistic  faculties, 
and  it  appears  as  much  in  the  minor  as  in  the 
major  features  of  the  narrative.  It  indicates  that 


54  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

Turgue*nieff  might,  if  he  chose,  produce  a  story  as 
faultlessly  symmetrical  as  was  ever  framed.  Why, 
then,  does  he  riot  so  choose  ?  The  reason  can  only 
be  that  he  deems  the  truth-seeming  of  his  narra 
tive  would  thereby  be  impaired.  "  He  is  only 
telling  a  story,"  the  reader  would  say,  "and  he 
shapes  the  events  and  persons  so  as  to  fit  the 
plot."  But  is  this  reason  reasonable  ?  To  those 
who  believe  that  God  has  no  hand  in  the  ordering 
of  human  affairs,  it  undoubtedly  is  reasonable. 
To  those  who  believe  the  contrary,  however,  it 
appears  as  if  the  story  of  no  human  life  or  com 
plex  of  lives  could  be  otherwise  than  a  rounded 
and  perfect  work  of  art — provided  only  that  the 
spectator  takes  note,  not  merely  of  the  superficial 
accidents  and  appearances,  but  also  of  the  under 
lying  divine  purpose  and  significance.  The  ab 
sence  of  this  recognition  in  Turgue'nieff's  novels 
is  the  explanation  of  them :  holding  the  creed 
their  author  does,  he  could  not  have  written  them 
otherwise ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  had  his  creed 
been  different,  he  very  likely  would  not  have  writ 
ten  novels  at  all. 

The  pioneer,  in  whatever  field  of  thought  or  ac 
tivity,  is  apt  to  be  also  the  most  distinguished  fig 
ure  therein.  The  consciousness  of  being  the  first 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM.  55 

augments  the  keenness  of  his  impressions,  and  a 
mind  that  can  see  and  report  in  advance  of  others 
a  new  order  of  things  may  claim  a  finer  organiza 
tion   than   the   ordinary.     The  vitality  of  nature 
animates  him  who  has  insight  to  discern  her  at 
first  hand,  whereas  his  followers  miss  the  fresh 
ness  of  the  morning,  because,  instead  of  discover 
ing,  they  must  be  content  to  illustrate  and  refine. 
Those   of   our  writers  who   betray  TurgueniefFs 
influence  are  possibly  his  superiors  in  finish  and 
culture,  but  their  faculty  of  convincing  and  pre 
senting  is  less.     Their  interest  in  their  own  work 
seems  less  serious  than  his;  they  may  entertain 
us  more,  but  they  do  not  move  and  magnetize  so 
much.     The  persons  and   events  of   their  stories 
are  conscientiously  studied,  and  are  nothing  if  not 
natural;  but  they  lack  distinction.    In  an  epitome 
of  life  so  concise  as  the  longest  novel  must  needs 
be,  to  use  any  but  types  is  waste  of   time  and 
space.     A  typical  character  is  one  who  combines 
the  traits  or  beliefs  of  a  certain  class  to  which  he 
is  affiliated  —  who  is,  practically,  all  of  them  and 
himself  besides;  and,  when  we  know  him,  there 
is  nothing  left  worth  knowing  about  the  others. 
In    Shakespeare's     Hamlet     and     Enobarbus,    in 
Fielding's    Squire    Western,    in    Walter    Scott's 


56  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

Edie  Ochiltree  and  Meg  Merrilies,  in  Balzac's 
Pere  Goriot  and  Madame  Marneff,  in  Thackeray's 
Colonel  Newcome  and  Becky  Sharp,  in  Turgue*- 
niefFs  Bazarof  and  Dimitri  Roudine,  we  meet 
persons  who  exhaust  for  us  the  groups  to  which 
they  severally  belong.  Bazarof,  the  nihilist,  for 
instance,  reveals  to  us  the  motives  and  influences 
that  have  made  nihilism,  so  that  we  feel  that  noth 
ing  essential  on  that  score  remains  to  be  learnt. 

The  ability  to  recognize  and  select  types  is  a 
test  of  a  novelist's  talent  and  experience.  It 
implies  energy  to  rise  above  the  blind  walls  of 
one's  private  circle  of  acquaintance ;  the  power 
to  perceive  what  phases  of  thought  and  existence 
are  to  be  represented  as  well  as  who  represents 
them;  the  sagacity  to  analyze  the  age  or  the 
moment  and  reproduce  its  dominant  features. 
The  feat  is  difficult,  and,  when  done,  by  no  means 
blows  its  own  trumpet.  On  the  contrary,  the 
reader  must  open  his  eyes  to  be  aware  of  it. 
He  finds  the  story  clear  and  easy  of  comprehen 
sion  ;  the  characters  come  home  to  him  familiarly 
and  remain  distinctly  in  his  memory;  he  under 
stands  something  which  was,  till  now,  vague  to 
him:  but  he  is  as  likely  to  ascribe  this  to  an 
exceptional  lucidity  in  his  own  mental  condition 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM.  57 

as  to  any  special  merit  in  the  author.  Indeed, 
it  often  happens  that  the  author  who  puts  out-of- 
the-way  personages  into  his  stories  —  characters 
that  represent  nothing  but  themselves,  or  pos 
sibly  some  eccentricity  of  invention  on  their 
author's  part,  will  gain  the  latter  a  reputation 
for  cleverness  higher  than  his  fellow's  who  por 
trays  mankind  in  its  masses  as  well  as  in  its  de 
tails.  But  the  finest  imagination  is  not  that 
which  evolves  strange  images,  but  that  which 
explains  seeming  contradictions,  and  reveals  the 
unity  within  the  difference  and  the  harmony 
beneath  the  discord. 

Were  we  to  compare  our  fictitious  literature, 
as  a  whole,  with  that  of  England,  the  balance 
must  be  immeasurably  on  the  English  side.  Even 
confining  ourselves  to  to-day,  and  to  the  prospect 
of  to-morrow,  it  must  be  conceded  that,  in  settled 
method,  in  guiding  tradition,  in  training  and 
associations  both  personal  and  inherited,  the  aver 
age  English  novelist  is  better  circumstanced  than 
the  American.  Nevertheless,  the  English  novel 
ist  is  not  at  present  writing  better  novels  than 
the  American.  The  reason  seems  to  be  that  he 
uses  no  material  which  has  not  been  in  use  for 
hundreds  of  years ;  and  to  say  that  such  material 


58  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

begins  to  lose  its  freshness  is  not  putting  the  case 
too  strongly.  He  has  not  been  able  to  detach 
himself  from  the  paralyzing  background  of  Eng 
lish  conventionality.  The  vein  was  rich,  but  it 
is  worn  out ;  and  the  half-dozen  pioneers  had  all 
the  luck. 

There  is  no  commanding  individual  imagination 
in  England — nor,  to  say  the  truth,  does  there 
seem  to  be  any  in  America.  But  we  have  what 
they  have  not  —  a  national  imaginative  tendency. 
There  are  no  fetters  upon  our  fancy;  and,  how 
ever  deeply  our  real  estate  may  be  mortgaged, 
there  is  freedom  for  our  ideas.  England  has  not 
yet  appreciated  the  true  inwardness  of  a  favorite 
phrase  of  ours,  —  a  new  deal.  And  yet  she  is 
tired  to  death  of  her  own  stale  stories ;  and 
when,  by  chance,  any  one  of  her  writers  happens 
to  chirp  out  a  note  a  shade  different  from  the 
prevailing  key,  the  whole  nation  pounces  down 
upon  him,  with  a  shriek  of  half-incredulous  joy, 
and  buys  him  up,  at  the  rate  of  a  million  copies 
a  year.  Our  own  best  writers  are  more  read  in 
England,  or,  at  any  rate,  more  talked  about,  than 
their  native  crop ;  not  so  much,  perhaps,  because 
they  are  different  as  because  their  difference  is 
felt  to  be  of  a  significant  and  typical  kind.  It 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM.  59 

has  in  it  a  gleam  of  the  new  day.  They  are  ^ 
realistic  ;  but  realism,  so  far  as  it  involves  a  faith 
ful  study  of  nature,  is  useful.  The  illusion  of 
a  loftier  reality,  at  which  we  should  aim,  must 
be  evolved  from  adequate  knowledge  of  reality 
itself.  The  spontaneous  and  assured  faith,  which 
is  the  mainspring  of  sane  imagination,  must  be 
preceded  by  the  doubt  and  rejection  of  what  is 
lifeless  and  insincere.  We  desire  no  resurrection-- 
of  the  Ann  RadclyfTe  type  of  romance:  but  the 
true  alternative  to  this  is  not  such  a  mixture  of 
the  police  gazette  and  the  medical  reporter  as 
Emile  Zola  offers  us.  So  far  as  Zola  is  conscien 
tious,  let  him  live ;  but,  in  so  far  as  he  is  revolt 
ing,  let  him  die.  Many  things  in  the  world  seem 
ugly  and  purposeless;  but  to  a  deeper  intelli 
gence  than  ours,  they  are  a  part  of  beauty  and 
design.  What  is  ugly  and  irrelevant,  can  never 
enter,  as  such,  into  a  work  of  art;  because  the 
artist  is  bound,  by  a  sacred  obligation,  to  show 
us  the  complete  curve  only,  —  never  the  undevel 
oped  fragments. 

But  were  the  firmament  of  England  still  illu 
minated  with  her  Dickenses,  her  Thackerays, 
and  her  Brontes,  I  should  still  hold  our  state  to 
be  fuller  of  promise  than  hers.  It  may  be  ad- 


60  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

mitted  that  almost  everything  was  against  our 
producing  anything  good  in  literature.  Our  men, 
in  the  first  place,  had  to  write  for  nothing;  be 
cause  the  publisher,  who  can  steal  a  readable 
English  novel,  will  not  pay  for  an  American 
novel,  for  the  mere  patriotic  gratification  of  ena 
bling  its  American  author  to  write  it.  In  the 
second  place,  they  had  nothing  to  write  about, 
for  the  national  life  was  too  crude  and  hetero 
geneous  for  ordinary  artistic  purposes.  Thirdly, 
they  had  no  one  to  write  for :  because,  although, 
in  one  sense,  there  might  be  readers  enough,  in  a 
higher  sense  there  were  scarcely  any,  —  that  is  to 
say,  there  was  no  organized  critical  body  of  liter 
ary  opinion,  from  which  an  author  could  confi 
dently  look  to  receive  his  just  meed  of  encourage 
ment  and  praise.  Yet,  in  spite  of  all  this,  and  not 
to  mention  honored  names  that  have  ceased  or  are 
ceasing  to  cast  their  living  weight  into  the  scale, 
we  are  contributing  much  that  is  fresh  and  orig 
inal,  and  something,  it  may  be,  that  is  of  perma 
nent  value,  to  literature.  We  have  accepted  the 
situation ;  and,  since  no  straw  has  been  vouch 
safed  us  to  make  our  bricks  with,  we  are  trying 
manfully  to  make  them  without. 

It    will    not    be    necessary,   however,   to    call 


NOVELS   AND   AGNOSTICISM.  61 

the  roll  of  all  the  able  and  popular  gentle 
men  who  are  contending  in  the  forlorn  hope 
against  disheartening  odds ;  and  as  for  the  ladies 
who  have  honored  our  literature  by  their  con 
tributions,  it  will  perhaps  be  well  to  adopt 
regarding  them  a  course  analogous  to  that  which 
Napoleon  is  said  to  have  pursued  with  the  letters 
sent  to  him  while  in  Italy.  He  left  them 
unread  until  a  certain  time  had  elapsed,  and 
then  found  that  most  of  them  no  longer  needed 
attention.  We  are  thus  brought  face  to  face  with 
the  two  men  with  whom  every  critic  of  American 
novelists  has  to  reckon ;  who  represent  what  is 
carefullest  and  newest  in  American  fiction ;  and 
it  remains  to  inquire  how  far  their  work  has  been 
moulded  by  the  skeptical  or  radical  spirit  of  which 
Turgudnieff  is  the  chief  exemplar. 

The  author  of  "  Daisy  Miller  "  had  been  writing 
for  several  years  before  the  bearings  of  his  course 
could  be  confidently  calculated.  Some  of  his 
earlier  tales,  —  as,  for  example,  "The  Madonna 
of  the  Future,"  —  while  keeping  near  reality  on 
one  side,  are  on  the  other  eminently  fanciful  and 
ideal.  He  seemed  to  feel  the  attraction  of  fairy 
land,  but  to  lack  resolution  to  swallow  it  whole ; 
so,  instead  of  idealizing  both  persons  and  plot,  as 


62  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

Hawthorne  had  ventured  to  do,  he  tried  to  per 
suade  real  persons  to  work  out  an  ideal  destiny. 
But  the  tact,  delicacy,  and  reticence  with  which 
these  attempts  were  made  did  not  blind  him  to 
the  essential  incongruity  ;  either  realism  or  ideal 
ism  had  to  go,  and  step  by  step  he  dismissed  the 
latter,  until  at  length  TurgueniefFs  current 
caught  him.  By  this  time,  however,  his  culture 
had  become  too  wide,  and  his  independent  views 
too  confirmed,  to  admit  of  his  yielding  uncondi 
tionally  to  the  great  Russian.  Especially  his 
critical  familiarity  with  French  literature  opera 
ted  to  broaden,  if  at  the  same  time  to  render  less 
trenchant,  his  method  and  expression.  His  char 
acters  are  drawn  with  fastidious  care,  and  closely 
follow  the  tones  and  fashions  of  real  life.  Each 
utterance  is  so  exactly  like  what  it  ought  to  be 
that  the  reader  feels  the  same  sort  of  pleased  sur 
prise  as  is  afforded  by  a  phonograph  which  re 
peats,  with  all  the  accidental  pauses  and  inflec 
tions,  the  speech  spoken  into  it.  Yet  the  words 
come  through  a  medium ;  they  are  not  quite  spon 
taneous  ;  these  figures  have  not  the  sad,  human 
inevitableness  of  Turgudnieff's  people.  The  rea 
son  seems  to  be  (leaving  the  difference  between 
the  genius  of  the  two  writers  out  of  account)  that 


NOVELS  AND   AGNOSTICISM.  63 

the  American,  unlike  the  Russian,  recognizes  no 
tragic  importance  in  the  situation.  To  the  latter, 
the  vision  of  life  is  so  ominous  that  his  voice 
waxes  sonorous  and  terrible  ;  his  eyes,  made  keen 
by  foreboding,  see  the  leading  elements  of  the 
conflict,  and  them  only ;  he  is  no  idle  singer  of 
an  empty  day,  but  he  speaks  because  speech 
springs  out  of  him.  To  his  mind,  the  foundations 
of  human  welfare  are  in  jeopardy,  and  it  is  full 
time  to  decide  what  means  may  avert  the  danger. 
But  the  American  does  not  think  any  cataclysm 
is  impending,  or  if  any  there  be,  nobody  can  help 
it.  The  subjects  that  best  repay  attention  are 
the  minor  ones  of  civilization,  culture,  behavior ; 
how  to  avoid  certain  vulgarities  and  follies,  how 
to  inculcate  certain  prii  iples:  and  to  illustrate 
these  points  heroic  types  are  not  needed.  In 
other  words,  the  situation  being  unheroic,  so  must 
the  actors  be ;  for,  apart  from  the  inspirations  of 
circumstances,  Napoleon  no  more  than  J-ohn 
Smith  is  recognizable  as  a  hero. 

Now,  in  adopting  this  view,  a  writer  places  him 
self  under  several  manifest  disadvantages.  If 
you  are  to  be  an  agnostic,  it  is  better  (for  novel- 
writing  purposes)  not  to  be  a  complacent  or  re 
signed  one.  Otherwise  your  characters  will  find 


64  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

it  difficult  to  show  what  is  in  them.  A  man  re 
veals  and  classifies  himself  in  proportion  to  the 
severity  of  the  condition  or  action  required  of 
him ;  hence  the  American  novelist's  people  are  in 
considerable  straits  to  make  themselves  ade 
quately  known  to  us.  They  cannot  lay  bare 
their  inmost  soul  over  a  cup  of  tea  or  a  picture 
by  Corot ;  so,  in  order  to  explain  themselves,  they 
must  not  only  submit  to  dissection  at  the  author's 
hands,  but  must  also  devote  no  little  time  and 
ingenuity  to  dissecting  themselves  and  one  an 
other.  But  dissection  is  one  thing,  and  the  living 
word  rank  from  the  heart  and  absolutely  reeking 
of  the  human  creature  that  uttered  it  —  the  word 
that  Turgue'niefFs  people  are  constantly  uttering— 
is  another.  Moreover,  in  the  dearth  of  command 
ing  traits  and  stirring  events,  there  is  a  continual 
temptation  to  magnify  those  which  are  petty  and 
insignificant.  Instead  of  a  telescope  to  sweep  the 
heavens,  we  are  furnished  with  a  microscope  to 
detect  infusoria.  We  want  a  description  of  a 
mountain;  and,  instead  of  receiving  an  outline, 
naked  and  severe,  perhaps,  but  true  and  impres 
sive,  we  are  introduced  to  a  tiny  field  on  its 
immeasurable  side,  and  we  go  botanizing  and 
insect-hunting  there.  This  is  realism  ;  but  it  is 


NOVELS  AND  AGNOSTICISM.  65 

the  realism  of  texture,  not  of  form  and  relation. 
It  encourages  our  glance  to  be  near-sighted  in 
stead  of  comprehensive.  Above  all,  there  is  a 
misgiving  that  we  do  not  touch  the  writer's  true 
quality,  and  that  these  scenes  of  his,  so  elabo 
rately  and  conscientiously  prepared,  have  cost  him 
much  thought  and  pains,  but  not  one  throb  of 
the  heart  or  throe  of  the  spirit.  The  experiences 
that  he  depicts  have  not,  one  fancies,  marked 
wrinkles  on  his  forehead  or  turned  his  hair  gray. 
There  are  two  kinds  of  reserve  —  the  reserve 
which  feels  that  its  message  is  too  mighty  for  it, 
and  the  reserve  which  feels  that  it  is  too  mighty 
for  its  message.  Our  new  school  of  writers  is 
reserved,  but  its  reserve  does  not  strike  one  as 
being  of  the  former  kind.  It  cannot  be  said 
of  any  one  of  Mr.  James's  stories,  "  This  is  his 
best,"  or  "  This  is  his  worst,"  because  no  one  of 
them  is  all  one  way.  They  have  their  phases  of 
strength  and  veracity,  and,  also,  phases  that  are 
neither  veracious  nor  strong.  The  cause  may 
either  lie  in  a  lack  of  experience  in  a  cer 
tain  direction  on  the  writer's  part ;  or  else  in 
his  reluctance  to  write  up  to  the  experience  he 
has.  The  experience  in  question  is  not  of  the 
ways  of  the  world,  —  concerning  which  Mr.  James 


66  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

has  every  sign  of  being  politely  familiar,  —  nor 
of  men  and  women  in  their  every-day  aspect ; 
still  less  of  literary  ways  and  means,  for  of 
these,  in  his  own  line,  he  is  a  master.  The 
experience  referred  to  is  experience  of  passion. 
If  Mr.  James  be  not  incapable  of  describing 
passion,  at  all  events  he  has  still  to  show  that  he 
is  capable  of  it.  He  has  introduced  us  to  many 
characters  that  seem  to  have  in  them  capacity  for 
the  highest  passion,  —  as  witness  Christina  Light, 
—  and  yet  he  has  never  allowed  them  an  oppor 
tunity  to  develop  it.  He  seems  to  evade  the  situ 
ation  ;  but  the  evasion  is  managed  with  so  much 
plausibility  that,  although  we  may  be  disap 
pointed,  or  even  irritated,  and  feel,  more  or  less 
vaguely,  that  we  have  been  unfairly  dealt  with, 
we  are  unable  to  show  exactly  where  or  how  the 
unfairness  comes  in.  Thus  his  novels  might  be 
compared  to  a  beautiful  face,  full  of  culture  and 
good  breeding,  but  lacking  that  fire  of  the  eye 
and  fashion  of  the  lip  that  betray  a  living  human 
soul. 

The  other  one  of  the  two  writers  whose  names 
are  so  often  mentioned  together,  seems  to  have 
taken  up  the  subject  of  our  domestic  and  social 
pathology;  and  the  minute  care  and  conscientious 


NOVELS  AND  AGNOSTICISM.  67 

veracity  which  he  has  brought  to  bear  uron  his 
work  has  not  been  surpassed,  even  by  Shake 
speare.  But,  if  I  could  venture  a  criticism  upon 
his  productions,  it  would  be  to  the  effect  that 
there  is  not  enough  fiction  in  them.  They  are 
elaborate  and  amiable  reports  of  what  we  see 
around  us.  They  are  not  exactly  imaginative,  — 
in  the  sense  in  which  I  have  attempted  to  define 
the  word.  There  are  two  ways  of  warning  a  man 
against  unwholesome  life  —  one  is,  to  show  him  a 
picture  of  disease ;  the  other  is,  to  show  him  a 
picture  of  health.  The  former  is  the  negative, 
the  latter  the  positive  treatment.  Both  have 
their  merits  ;  but  the  latter  is,  perhaps,  the  better 
adapted  to  novels,  the  former  to  essays.  A  novel 
ist  should  not  only  know  what  he  has  got ;  he 
should  also  know  what  he  wants.  His  mind 
should  have  an  active,  or  theorizing,  as  well 
as  a  passive,  or  contemplative,  side.  He  should 
have  energy  to  discount  the  people  he  person 
ally  knows ;  the  power  to  perceive  what  phases 
of  thought  are  to  be  represented,  as  well  as 
to  describe  the  persons  who  happen  to  be  their 
least  inadequate  representatives ;  the  sagacity 
to  analyze  the  age  or  the  moment,  and  to  re 
veal  its  tendency  4and  meaning.  Mr.  Ho  wells 


68  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

has  produced  a  great  deal  of  finely  wrought  tapes 
try  ;  but  does  not  seem,  as  yet,  to  have  found  a 
hall  fit  to  adorn  it  with. 

And  yet  Mr.  James  and  Mr.  Ho  wells  have  done 
more  than  all  the  rest  of  us  to  make  our  literature 
respectable  during  the  last  ten  years.  If  texture 
be  the  object,  they  have  brought  texture  to  a  fine 
ness  never  surpassed  anywhere.  They  have  dis 
covered  charm  and  grace  in  much  that  was  only 
blank  before.  They  have  detected  and  described 
points  of  human  nature  hitherto  unnoticed,  which, 
if  not  intrinsically  important,  will  one  day  be 
made  auxiliary  to  the  production  of  pictures  of 
broader  as  well  as  minuter  veracity  than  have 
heretofore  been  produced.  All  that  seems  want 
ing  thus  far  is  a  direction,  an  aim,  a  belief.  Ag 
nosticism  has  brought  about  a  pause  for  a  while, 
and  no  doubt  a  pause  is  preferable  to  some  kinds 
of  activity.  It  may  enable  us,  when  the  time 
comes  to  set  forward  again,  to  do  so  with  better 
equipment  and  more  intelligent  purpose.  It  will 
not  do  to  be  always  at  a  prophetic  heat  of  enthusi 
asm,  sympathy,  denunciation:  the  coolly  critical 
mood  is  also  useful  to  prune  extravagance  and 
promote  a  sense  of  responsibility.  The  novels  of 
Mr.  James  and  of  Mr.  Howells  have  taught  us  that 


NOVELS  AND  AGNOSTICISM.  69 

men  and  women  are  creatures  of  infinitely  compli 
cated  structure,  and  that  even  the  least  of  these 
complications,  if  it  is  portrayed  at  all,  is  worth 
portraying  truthfully.  But  we  cannot  forget,  on 
the  other  hand,  that  honest  emotion  and  hearty 
action  are  necessary  to  the  wholesomeness  of  soci 
ety,  because  in  their  absence  society  is  afflicted 
with  a  lamentable  sameness  and  triviality ;  the 
old  primitive  impulses  remain,  but  the  food  on 
which  they  are  compelled  to  feed  is  insipid  and 
unsustaining ;  our  eyes  are  turned  inward  instead 
of  outward,  and  each  one  of  us  becomes  himself 
the  Rome  towards  which  all  his  roads  lead.  Such 
books  as  these  authors  have  written  are  not  the 
Great  American  Novel,  because  they  take  life  and 
humanity  not  in  their  loftier,  but  in  their  lesser 
manifestations.  They  are  the  side  scenes  and  the 
background  of  a  story  that  has  yet  to  be  written. 
That  story  will  have  the  interest  not  only  of  the 
collision  of  private  passions  and  efforts,  but  of  the 
great  ideas  and  principles  which  characterize  and 
animate  a  nation.  It  will  discriminate  between 
what  is  accidental  and  what  is  permanent,  be 
tween  what  is  realistic  and  what  is  real,  between 
what  is  sentimental  and  what  is  sentiment.  It 
will  show  us  not  only  what  we  are,  but  what  we 


70  CONFESSIONS    AND  CRITICISMS. 

are  to  be ;  not  only  what  to  avoid,  but  what  to  do. 
It  will  rest  neither  in  the  tragic  gloom  of  Turgud- 
nieff,  nor  in  the  critical  composure  of  James,  nor 
in  the  gentle  deprecation  of  Howells,  but  will  de 
monstrate  that  the  weakness  of  man  is  the  motive 
and  condition  of  his  strength.  It  will  not  shrink 
from  romance,  nor  from  ideality,  nor  from  artistic 
completeness,  because  it  will  know  at  what  depths 
and  heights  of  life  these  elements  are  truly  opera 
tive.  It  will  be  American,  not  because  its  scene 
is  laid  or  its  characters  born  in  the  United  States, 
but  because  its  burden  will  be  reaction  against  old 
tyrannies  and  exposure  of  new  hypocrisies ;  a  ref 
utation  of  respectable  falsehoods,  and  a  procla 
mation  of  unsophisticated  truths.  Indeed,  let  us 
take  heed  and  diligently  improve  our  native  tal 
ent,  lest  a  day  come  when  the  Great  American 
Novel  make  its  appearance,  but  written  in  a  for 
eign  language,  and  by  some  author  who  —  how 
ever  purely  American  at  heart  —  never  set  foot  on 
the  shores  of  the  Republic. 


CHAPTER  III. 

AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION. 

CONTEMPORARY  criticism  will  have  it  that,  in 
order  to  create  an  American  Literature,  we  must 
use  American  materials.  The  term  "  Literature  " 
has,  no  doubt,  come  to  be  employed  in  a  loose 
sense.  The  London  Saturday  Review  has  (or 
used  to  have  until  lately)  a  monthly  two-column 
article  devoted  to  what  it  called  "American  Liter 
ature,"  three-fourths  of  which  were  devoted  to  an 
examination  of  volumes  of  State  Histories,  Statis- 
cal  Digests,  Records  of  the  Census,  and  other  such 
works  as  were  never,  before  or  since,  suspected 
of  being  literature;  while  the  remaining  fourth 
mentioned  the  titles  (occasionally  with  a  line  of 
comment)  of  whatever  productions  were  at  hand 
in  the  way  of  essays,  novels,  and  poetry.  This 
would  seem  to  indicate  that  we  may  have  —  nay, 
are  already  possessed  of — an  American  Literature, 
composed  of  American  materials,  provided  only 
that  we  consent  to  adopt  the  Saturday  Review's 
conception  of  what  literature  is. 

71 


72  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

Many  of  us  believe,  however,  that  the  essays, 
the  novels,  and  the  poetry,  as  well  as  the  statistical 
digests,  ought  to  go  to  the  making  up  of  a  national 
literature.  It  has  been  discovered,  however,  that 
the  existence  of  the  former  does  not  depend,  to 
the  same  extent  as  that  of  the  latter,  upon  the 
employment  of  exclusively  American  material.  A 
book  about  the  census,  if  it  be  not  American,  is 
nothing ;  but  a  poem  or  a  romance,  though  writ 
ten  by  a  native-born  American,  who,  perhaps,  has 
never  crossed  the  Atlantic,  not  only  may,  but  fre 
quently  does,  have  nothing  in  it  that  can  be 
called  essentially  American,  except  its  English 
and,  occasionally,  its  ideas.  And  the  question 
arises  whether  such  productions  can  justly  be  held 
to  form  component  parts  of  what  shall  hereafter 
be  recognized  as  the  literature  of  America. 

How  was  it  with  the  makers  of  English  litera 
ture  ?  Beginning  with  Chaucer,  his  "  Canterbury 
Pilgrims"  is  English,  both  in  scene  and  character; 
it  is  even  mentioned  of  the  Abbess  that  "  Frenche 
of  Paris  was  to  her  unknowe  " ;  but  his  "  Legende 
of  Goode  Women "  might,  so  far  as  its  subject- 
matter  is  concerned,  have  been  written  by  a 
French,  a  Spanish,  or  an  Italian  Chaucer,  just  as 
well  as  by  the  British  Daniel.  Spenser's  "  Faerie 


AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION.  73 

Queene "  numbers  St.  George  and  King  Arthur 
among  its  heroes ;  but  its  scene  is  laid  in  Faerie 
Lande,  if  it  be  laid  anywhere,  and  it  is  a  bare 
faced  moral  allegory  throughout.  Shakespeare 
wrote  thirty-seven  plays,  the  elimination  of  which 
from  English  literature  would  undeniably  be  a 
serious  loss  to  it ;  yet,  of  these  plays  twenty-three 
have  entirely  foreign  scenes  and  characters.  Mil 
ton,  as  a  political  writer,  was  English;  but  his 
"  Paradise  Lost  and  Regained,"  his  "  Samson,"  his 
"Ode  on  the  Nativity,"  his  "Comus,"  bear  no 
reference  to  the  land  of  his  birth.  Dry  den's  best- 
known  work  to-day  is  his  "Alexander's  Feast." 
Pope  has  come  down  to  us  as  the  translator  of 
Homer.  Richardson,  Fielding,  Smollett,  and 
Sterne  are  the  great  quartet  of  English  novelists 
of  the  last  century ;  but  Smollett,  in  his  preface 
to  "  Roderick  Random,"  after  an  admiring  allusion 
to  the  "  Gil  Bias "  of  Le  Sage,  goes  on  to  say : 
"The  following  sheets  I  have  modelled  on  his 
plan  " ;  and  Sterne  was  always  talking  and  think 
ing  about  Cervantes,  and  comparing  himself  to 
the  great  Spaniard :  "  I  think  there  is  more  laugh 
able  humor,  with  an  equal  degree  of  Cervantic 
satire,  if  not  more,  than  in  the  last,"  he  writes  of 
one  of  his  chapters,  to  "my  witty  widow,  Mrs.  F." 


74  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

Many  even  of  Walter  Scott's  romances  are  un- 
English  in  their  elements ;  and  the  fame  of  Shel 
ley,  Keats,  and  Byron  rests  entirely  upon  their 
"foreign"  work.  Coleridge's  poetry  and  philoso 
phy  bear  no  technical  stamp  of  nationality ;  and, 
to  come  down  to  later  times,  Carlyle  was  pro 
foundly  imbued  with  Germanism,  while  the 
"  Romola  "  of  George  Eliot  and  the  "  Cloister  and 
the  Hearth  "  of  Charles  Reade  are  by  many  con 
sidered  to  be  the  best  of  their  works.  In  the 
above  enumeration  innumerable  instances  in 
point  are,  of  course,  omitted;  but  enough  have 
been  given,  perhaps,  to  show  that  imaginative 
writers  have  not  generally  been  disowned  by  their 
country  on  the  ground  that  they  have  availed 
themselves,  in  their  writings,  of  other  scenes  and 
characters  than  those  of  their  own  immediate 
neighborhoods. 

The  statistics  of  the  work  of  the  foremost 
American  writers  could  easily  be  shown  to  be 
much  more  strongly  imbued  with  the  specific 
flavor  of  their  environment.  Benjamin  Franklin, 
though  he  was  an  author  before  the  United  States 
existed,  was  American  to  the  marrow.  The 
"  Leather-Stocking  Tales "  of  Cooper  are  the 
American  epic.  Irving's  "  Knickerbocker  "  and 


AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION.  75 

his  "  Woolfert's  Roost "  will  long  outlast  his  other 
productions.    Poe's  most  popular  tale,  "The  Gold- 
Bug,"  is  American  in  its  scene,  and  so  is  "  The 
Mystery  of  Marie  Roget,"  in  spite  of  its  French 
nomenclature  ;  and  all  that  he  wrote  is  strongly 
tinged  with  the  native  hue  of  his  strange  genius. 
Longfellow's  "  Evangeline  "  and  "  Hiawatha  "  and 
"  Miles  Standish,"  and  such  poems  as  "  The  Skel 
eton  in  Armor"  and  "The  Building  of  the  Ship," 
crowd  out  of  sight  his   graceful  translations  and 
adaptations.     Emerson  is  the  veritable  American 
eagle  of  our  literature,  so  that  to  be  Emersonian 
is  to  be  American.     Whittier  and  Holmes  have 
never  looked  beyond  their  native  boundaries,  and 
Hawthorne  has  brought  the  stern   gloom  of  the 
Puritan  period  and  the  uneasy  theorizings  of  the 
present  day  into  harmony  with  the  universal  and 
permanent  elements  of  human  nature.     There  was 
certainly  nothing  European  visible  in   the  crude 
but  vigorous  stories  of  Theodore  Winthrop ;  and 
Bret  Harte,  the  most  brilliant  figure  among  our 
later  men,  is  not  only  American,  but  Californian, 
—  as  is,  likewise,  the  Poet  of  the  Sierras.     It  is 
not   necessary   to   go   any   further.      Mr.    Henry 
James,  having  enjoyed  early  and  singular  oppor 
tunities  of  studying  the  effects  of  the  recent  an- 


76  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

nual  influx  of  Americans,  cultured  and  otherwise, 
into  England  and  the  Continent,  has  very  sensibly 
and  effectively,  and  with  exquisite  grace  of  style 
and  pleasantness  of  thought,  made  the  phenome 
non  the  theme  of  a  remarkable  series  of  stories. 
Hereupon  the  cry  of  an  "International  School" 
has  been  raised,  and  critics  profess  to  be  seriously 
alarmed  lest  we  should  ignore  the  signal  advan 
tages  for  mise-en-scene  presented  by  this  Western 
half  of  the  planet,  and  should  enter  into  vain  and 
unpatriotic  competition  with  foreign  writers  on 
their  own  ground.  The  truth  is,  meanwhile,  that 
it  would  have  been  a  much  surer  sign  of  affecta 
tion  in  us  to  have  abstained  from  literary  com 
ment  upon  the  patent  and  notable  fact  of  this 
international  rapprochement,  —  which  is  just  as 
characteristic  an  American  trait  as  the  episode  of 
the  Argonauts  of  1849,  —  and  we  have  every 
reason  to  be  grateful  to  Mr.  Henry  James,  and  to 
his  school,  if  he  has  any,  for  having  rescued  us 
from  the  opprobrium  of  so  foolish  a  piece  of  know- 
nothingism.  The  phase  is,  of  course,  merely  tem 
porary  ;  its  interest  and  significance  will  presently 
be  exhausted ;  but,  because  we  are  American,  are 
we  to  import  no  French  cakes  and  English  ale  ? 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  we  are  too  timid  and  self- 


AMERICANISM  IN   FICTION.  77 

conscious;  and  these  infirmities  imply  a  much 
more  serious  obstacle  to  the  formation  of  a  char 
acteristic  literature  than  does  any  amount  of  gad 
ding  abroad. 

That  must  be  a  very  shallow  literature  which 
depends  for  its  national  flavor  and  character  upon 
its  topography  and  its  dialect ;  and  the  criticism 
which  can  conceive  of  no  deeper  Americanism 
than  this  is  shallower  still.  What  is  an  American 
book?  It  is  a  book  written  by  an  American, 
and  by  one  who  writes  as  an  American ;  that  is, 
unaffectedly.  So  an  English  book  is  a  book  writ 
ten  by  an  unaffected  Englishman.  What  differ 
ence  can  it  make  what  the  subject  of  the  writing 
is  ?  Mr.  Henry  James  lately  brought  out  a  vol 
ume  of  essays  on  "  French  Poets  and  Novelists." 
Mr.  E.  C.  Stedman  recently  published  a  series  of 
monographs  on  "  The  Victorian  Poets."  Are 
these  books  French  and  English,  or  are  they  non 
descript,  or  are  they  American?  Not  only  are 
they  American,  but  they  are  more  essentially 
American  than  if  they  had  been  disquisitions 
upon  American  literature.  And  the  reason  is,  of 
course,  that  they  subject  the  things  of  the  old 
world  to  the  tests  of  the  new,  and  thereby  vindi 
cate  and  illustrate  the  characteristic  mission  of 


78  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

America  to  mankind.  We  are  here  to  hold  up 
European  conventionalisms  and  prejudices  in  the 
light  of  the  new  .day,  and  thus  afford  everybody 
the  opportunity,  never  heretofore  enjoyed,  of 
judging  them  by  other  standards,  and  in  other 
surroundings  than  those  amidst  which  they  came 
into  existence.  In  the  same  way,  Emerson's 
"  English  Traits  "  is  an  American  thing,  and  it 
gives  categorical  reasons  why  American  things 
should  be.  And  what  is  an  American  novel 
except  a  novel  treating  of  persons,  places,  and 
ideas  from  an  American  point  of  view?  The 
point  of  view  is  the  point,  not  the  thing  seen 
from  it. 

But  it  is  said  that  "the  great  American  novel," 
in  order  fully  to  deserve  its  name,  ought  to  have 
American  scenery.  Some  thousands  of  years  ago, 
the  Greeks  had  a  novelist  —  Homer — who  evolved 
the  great  novel  of  that  epoch ;  but  the  scenery  of 
that  novel  was  Trojan,  not  Greek.  The  story  is  a 
criticism,  from  a  Greek  standpoint,  of  foreign 
affairs,  illustrated  with  practical  examples;  and, 
as  regards  treatment,  quite  as  much  care  is  be 
stowed  upon  the  delineation  of  Hector,  Priam, 
and  Paris,  as  upon  Agamemnon,  Menelaus,  and 
Achilles.  The  same  story,  told  by  a  Trojan 


AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION.  79 

Homer,  would  doubtless  have  been  very  different; 
but  it  is  by  no  means  certain  that  it  would  have 
been  any  better  told.  It  embodies,  whether  sym 
bolically  or  literally  matters  not,  the  triumph  of 
Greek  ideas  and  civilization.  But,  even  so,  the 
sympathies  of  the  reader  are  not  always,  or  per 
haps  uniformly,  on  the  conquering  side.  Homer 
was  doubtless  a  patriot,  but  he  shows  no  signs  of 
having  been  a  bigot.  He  described  that  great 
international  episode  with  singular  impartiality; 
what  chiefly  interested  him  was  the  play  of  human 
nature.  Nevertheless,  there  is  no  evidence  that 
the  Greeks  were  backward  in  admitting  his  claims 
as  their  national  poet ;  and  we  may  legitimately 
conclude  that  were  an  American  Homer  — 
whether  in  prose  or  poetry — to  appear  among 
us,  he  might  pitch  his  scene  where  he  liked  — 
in  Patagonia,  or  on  the  banks  of  the  Zambezi  — 
and  we  should  accept  the  situation  with  perfect 
equanimity.  Only  let  him  be  a  native  of  New 
York,  or  Boston,  or  San  Francisco,  or  Mullenville, 
and  be  inspired  with  the  American  idea,  and  we 
ask  no  more.  Whatever  he  writes  will  belong  to 
our  literature,  and  add  lustre  to  it. 

One  hears  many  complaints  about  the  snobbish 
ness  of  running  after  things  European.    Go  West, 


80  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

young  man,  these  moralists  say,  or  go  down  Fifth 
Avenue,  and  investigate  Chatham  Street,  and 
learn  that  all  the  elements  of  romance,  to  him 
who  has  the  seeing  eye,  lie  around  your  own  front 
doorstep  and  back  yard.  But  let  not  these  per 
sons  forget  that  he  who  fears  Europe  is  a  less  re 
spectable  snob  than  he  who  studies  it.  Let  us 
welcome  Europe  in  our  books  as  freely  as  we  do 
at  Castle  Garden ;  we  may  do  so  safely.  If  our 
digestion  be  not  strong  enough  to  assimilate  her, 
and  work  up  whatever  is  valuable  in  her  into  our 
own  bone  and  sinew,  then  America  is  not  the 
thing  we  took  her  for.  For  what  is  America  ?  Is 
it  simply  a  reproduction  of  one  of  these  Eastern 
nationalities,  which  we  are  so  fond  of  alluding  to 
as  effete  ?  Surely  not.  It  is  a  new  departure  in 
history ;  it  is  a  new  door  opened  to  the  develop 
ment  of  the  human  race,  or,  as  I  should  prefer  to 
say,  of  humanity.  We  are  misled  by  the  chatter 
of  politicians  and  the  bombast  of  Congress.  In 
the  course  of  ages,  the  time  has  at  last  arrived 
when  man,  all  over  this  planet,  is  entering  upon  a 
new  career  of  moral,  intellectual,  and  political 
emancipation;  and  America  is  the  concrete  ex 
pression  and  theatre  of  that  great  fact,  as  all 
spiritual  truths  find  their  fitting  and  representa- 


AMERICANISM   IN   FICTION.  81 

tive  physical  incarnation.  But  what  would  this 
huge  western  continent  be,  if  America  —  the  real 
America  of  the  mind  —  had  no  existence?  It 
would  be  a  body  without  a  soul,  and  would  bet 
ter,  therefore,  not  be  at  all.  If  America  is  to  be 
a  repetition  of  Europe  on  a  larger  scale,  it  is  not 
worth  the  pain  of  governing  it.  Europe  has 
shown  what  European  ideas  can  accomplish ;  and 
whatever  fresh  thought  or  impulse  comes  to  birth 
in  it  can  be  nothing  else  than  an  American 
thought  and  impulse,  and  must  sooner  or  later 
find  its  way  here,  and  become  naturalized  with  its 
brethren.  Buds  and  blossoms  of  America  are 
sprouting  forth  all  over  the  Old  World,  and  we 
gather  in  the  fruit.  They  do  not  find  themselves 
at  home  there,  but  they  know  where  their  home 
is.  The  old  country  feels  them  like  thorns  in  her 
old  flesh,  and  is  gladly  rid  of  them;  but  such 
prickings  are  the  only  wholesome  and  hopeful 
symptoms  she  presents ;  if  they  ceased  to  trouble 
her,  she  would  be  dead  indeed.  She  has  an  un 
easy  experience  before  her,  for  a  time ;  but  the 
time  will  come  when  she,  too,  will  understand 
that  her  ease  is  her  disease,  and  then  Castle 
Garden  may  close  its  doors,  for  America  will  be 
everywhere. 


82  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

If,  then,  America  is  something  vastly  more 
than  has  hitherto  been  understood  by  the  word 
nation,  it  is  proper  that  we  attach  to  that  other 
word,  patriotism,  a  significance  broader  and 
loftier  than  has  been  conceived  till  now.  By  so 
much  as  the  idea  that  we  represent  is  great,  by  so 
much  are  we,  in  comparison  with  it,  inevitably 
chargeable  with  littleness  and  short-comings.  For 
we  are  of  the  same  flesh  and  blood  as  our  neigh 
bors  ;  it  is  only  our  opportunities  and  our  respon 
sibilities  that  are  fairer  and  weightier  than  theirs. 
Circumstances  afford  every  excuse  to  them,  but 
none  to  us.  " E  Pluribus  Unum"  is  a  frivolous 
motto  ;  our  true  one  should  be,  "Noblesse  oblige" 
But,  with  a  strange  perversity,  in  all  matters  of 
comparison  between  ourselves  and  others,  we  dis 
play  what  we  are  pleased  to  call  our  patriotism  by 
an  absurd  touchiness  as  to  points  wherein  Europe, 
with  its  settled  and  polished  civilization,  must 
needs  be  our  superior ;  and  are  quite  indifferent 
about  those  things  by  which  our  real  strength  is 
constituted.  Can  we  not  be  content  to  learn  from 
Europe  the  graces,  the  refinements,  the  amenities 
of  life,  so  long  as  we  are  able  to  teach  her  life  it 
self  ?  For  my  part,  I  never  saw  in  England  any 
appurtenance  of  civilization,  calculated  to  add  to 


AMERICANISM  IN   FICTION.  83 

the  convenience  and  commodiousness  of  existence, 
that  did  not  seem  to  me  to  surpass  anything  of 
the  kind  that  we  have  in  this  country.  Notwith 
standing  which  —  and  I  am  far,  indeed,  from  hav 
ing  any  pretensions  to  asceticism  —  I  would  have 
been  fairly  stifled  at  the  idea  of  having  to  spend 
my  life  there.  No  American  can  live  in  Europe, 
unless  he  means  to  return  home,  or  unless,  at  any 
rate,  he  returns  here  in  mind,  in  hope,  in  belief. 
For  an  American  to  accept  England,  or  any  other 
country,  as  both  a  mental  and  physical  finality, 
would,  it  seems  to  me,  be  tantamount  to  renounc 
ing  his  very  life.  To  enjoy  English  comforts  at 
the  cost  of  adopting  English  opinions,  would  be 
about  as  pleasant  as  to  have  the  privilege  of  re 
taining  one's  body  on  condition  of  surrendering 
one's  soul,  and  would,  indeed,  amount  to  just 
about  the  same  thing. 

I  fail,  therefore,  to  feel  any  apprehension  as  to 
our  literature  becoming  Europeanized,  because 
whatever  is  American  in  it  must  lie  deeper  than 
anything  European  can  penetrate.  More  than 
that,  I  believe  and  hope  that  our  novelists  will 
deal  with  Europe  a  great  deal  more,  and  a  great 
deal  more  intelligently,  than  they  have  done  yet. 
It  is  a  true  and  healthy  artistic  instinct  that  leads 


84  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

them  to  do  so.  Hawthorne  —  and  no  American 
writer  had  a  better  right  than  he  to  contradict 
his  own  argument  —  says,  in  the  preface  to  the 
"  Marble  Faun,"  in  a  passage  that  has  been  often 
quoted,  but  will  bear  repetition  :  — 

"  Italy,  as  the  site  of  a  romance,  was  chiefly  valuable  to  him 
as  affording  a  sort  of  poetic  or  fairy  precinct,  where  actualities 
would  not  be  so  terribly  insisted  on  as  they  are,  and  must  needs 
be,  in  America.  No  author,  without  a  trial,  can  conceive  of 
the  difficulty  of  writing  a  romance  about  a  country  where  there 
is  no  shadow,  no  antiquity,  no  mystery,  no  picturesque  and 
gloomy  wrong,  nor  anything  but  a  commonplace  prosperity,  in 
broad  and  simple  daylight,  as  is  happily  the  case  with  my 
dear  native  land.  It  will  be  very  long,  I  trust,  before  ro 
mance  writers  may  find  congenial  and  easily  handled  themes, 
either  in  the  annals  of  our  stalwart  Republic,  or  in  any 
characteristic  and  probable  events  of  our  individual  lives. 
Romance  and  poetry,  ivy,  lichens,  and  wall-flowers,  need  ruin 
to  make  them  grow." 

Now,  what  is  to  be  understood  from  this  pas 
sage  ?  It  assumes,  in  the  first  place,  that  a  work 
of  art,  in  order  to  be  effective,  must  contain  pro 
found  contrasts  of  light  and  shadow  ;  and  then  it 
points  out  that  the  shadow,  at  least,  is  found  ready 
to  the  hand  in  Europe.  There  is  no  hint  of  patri 
otic  scruples  as  to  availing  one's  self  of  such  a 
"  picturesque  and  gloomy  "  background ;  if  it  is 
to  be  had,  then  let  it  be  taken  ;  the  main  object 
to  be  considered  is  the  work  of  art.  Europe,  in 


AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION.  85 

short,  afforded  an  excellent  quarry,  from  which, 
in  Hawthorne's  opinion,  the  American  novelist 
might  obtain  materials  which  are  conspicuously 
deficient  in  his  own  country,  and  which  that 
country  is  all  the  better  for  not  possessing.  In 
the  "  Marble  Faun  "  the  author  had  conceived  a 
certain  idea,  and  he  considered  that  he  had  been 
not  unsuccessful  in  realizing  it.  The  subject  was 
new,  and  full  of  especial  attractions  to  his  genius, 
and  it  would  manifestly  have  been  impossible  to 
adapt  it  to  an  American  setting.  There  was  one 
drawback  connected  with  it,  and  this  Hawthorne 
did  not  fail  to  recognize.  He  remarks  in  the  pre 
face  that  he  had  "  lived  too  long  abroad  not  to  be 
aware  that  a  foreigner  seldom  acquires  that  know 
ledge  of  a  country  at  once  flexible  and  profound, 
which  may  justify  him  in  endeavoring  to  idealize 
its  traits."  But  he  was  careful  not  to  attempt  "a 
portraiture  of  Italian  manners  and  character." 
He  made  use  of  the  Italian  scenery  and  atmos 
phere  just  so  far  as  was  essential  to  the  develop 
ment  of  his  idea,  and  consistent  with  the  extent  of 
his  Italian  knowledge ;  and,  for  the  rest,  fell  back 
upon  American  characters  and  principles.  The 
result  has  been  long  enough  before  the  world  to 
have  met  with  a  proper  appreciation.  I  have 


86  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

heard  regret  expressed  that  the  power  employed 
by  the  author  in  working  out  this  story  had  not 
been  applied  to  a  romance  dealing  with  a  purely 
American  subject.  But  to  analyze  this  objection 
is  to  dispose  of  it.  A  man  of  genius  is  not,  com 
monly,  enfeebled  by  his  own  productions ;  and, 
physical  accidents  aside,  Hawthorne  was  just  as 
capable  of  writing  another  "  Scarlet  Letter  "  after 
the  "Marble  Faun"  was  published,  as  he  had 
been  before.  Meanwhile,  few  will  deny  that  our 
literature  would  be  a  loser  had  the  "  Marble 
Faun  "  never  been  written. 

The  drawback  above  alluded  to  is,  however,  not 
to  be  underrated.  It  may  operate  in  two  ways. 
In  the  first  place,  the  American's  European  obser 
vations  may  be  inaccurate.  As  a  child,  looking  at 
a  sphere,  might  suppose  it  to  be  a  flat  disc,  shaded 
at  one  side  and  lighted  at  the  other,  so  a  sight 
seer  in  Europe  may  ascribe  to  what  he  beholds 
qualities  and  a  character  quite  at  variance  with 
what  a  more  fundamental  knowledge  would  have 
enabled  him  to  perceive.  In  the  second  place,  the 
stranger  in  a  strange  land,  be  he  as  accurate  as  he 
may,  will  always  tend  to  look  at  what  is  around 
him  objectively,  instead  of  allowing  it  subjectively 
—  or,  as  it  were,  unconsciously  —  to  color  his  nar- 


AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION.  87 

rative.  He  will  be  more  apt  directly  to  describe 
what  he  sees,  than  to  convey  the  feeling  or  aroma 
of  it  without  description.  It  would  doubtless,  for 
instance,  be  possible  for  Mr.  Henry  James  to 
write  an  "  English "  or  even  a  "  French "  novel 
without  falling  into  a  single  technical  error ;  but 
it  is  no  less  certain  that  a  native  writer,  of  equal 
ability,  would  treat  the  same  subject  in  a  very 
different  manner.  Mr.  Jamess'  version  might  con 
tain  a  great  deal  more  of  definite  information; 
but  the  native  work  would  insinuate  an  impres 
sion  which  both  comes  from  and  goes  to  a  greater 
depth  of  apprehension. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  not  contended  that 
any  American  should  write  an  "  English  "  or  any 
thing  but  an  "  American  "  novel.  The  contention 
is,  simply,  that  he  should  not  refrain  from  using 
foreign  material,  when  it  happens  to  suit  his  exi 
gencies,  merely  because  it  is  foreign.  Objective 
writing  may  be  quite  as  good  reading  as  subject 
ive  writing,  in  its  proper  place  and  function.  In 
fiction,  no  more  than  elsewhere,  may  a  writer  pre 
tend  to  be  what  he  is  not,  or  to  know  what  he 
knows  not.  When  he  finds  himself  abroad,  he 
must  frankly  admit  his  situation ;  and  more  will 
not  then  be  required  of  him  than  he  is  fairly 


88  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

competent  to  afford.  It  will  seldom  happen,  as 
Hawthorne  intimates,  that  he  can  successfully 
reproduce  the  inner  workings  and  philosophy  of 
European  social  and  political  customs  and  peculi 
arities  ;  but  he  can  give  a  picture  of  the  scenery 
as  vivid  as  can  the  aborigine,  or  more  so ;  he  can 
make  an  accurate  study  of  personal  native  charac 
ter  ;  and,  finally,  and  most  important  of  all,  he 
can  make  use  of  the  conditions  of  European  civil 
ization  in  events,  incidents,  and  situations  which 
would  be  impossible  on  this  side  of  the  water. 
The  restrictions,  the  traditions,  the  law,  and  the 
license  of  those  old  countries  are  full  of  sug 
gestions  to  the  student  of  character  and  circum 
stances,  and  supply  him  with  colors  and  effects 
that  he  would  else  search  for  in  vain.  For  the 
truth  may  as  well  be  admitted ;  we  are  at  a  distinct 
disadvantage,  in  America,  in  respect  of  the  mate 
rials  of  romance.  Not  that  vigorous,  pathetic, 
striking  stories  may  not  be  constructed  here;  and 
there  is  humor  enough,  the  humor  of  dialect,  of 
incongruity  of  character ;  but,  so  far  as  the  story 
depends  for  its  effect,  not  upon  psychical  and  per 
sonal,  but  upon  physical  and  general  events  and 
situations,  we  soon  feel  the  limit  of  our  resources. 
ALL  analysis  of  the  human  soul,  such  as  may  be 


AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION.  89 

found  in  the  "  House  of  the  Seven  Gables,"  for 
instance,  is  absolute  in  its  interest,  apart  from 
outward  conditions.  But  such  an  analysis  cannot 
be  carried  on,  so  to  say,  in  vacuo.  You  must  have 
solid  ground  to  stand  on ;  you  must  have  fitting 
circumstances,  background,  and  perspective.  The 
ruin  of  a  soul,  the  tragedy  of  a  heart,  demand,  as 
a  necessity  of  harmony  and  picturesque  effect,  a 
corresponding  and  conspiring  environment  and 
stage  —  just  as,  in  music,  the  air  in  the  treble  is 
supported  and  reverberated  by  the  bass  accompa 
niment.  The  immediate,  contemporary  act  or 
predicament  loses  more  than  half  its  meaning  and 
impressiveness  if  it  be  re-echoed  from  no  sounding- 
board  in  the  past  —  its  notes,  however  sweetly 
and  truly  touched,  fall  flatly  on  the  ear.  The 
deeper  we  attempt  to  pitch  the  key  of  an  Amer 
ican  story,  therefore,  the  more  difficulty  shall  we 
find  in  providing  a  congruous  setting  for  it ;  and 
it  is  interesting  to  note  how  the  masters  of  the 
craft  have  met  the  difficulty.  In  the  "  Seven  Ga 
bles  "  —  and  I  take  leave  to  say  that  if  I  draw 
illustrations  from  this  particular  writer,  it  is  for 
no  other  reason  than  that  he  presents,  more  for 
cibly  than  most,  a  method  of  dealing  with  the 
special  problem  we  are  considering  —  Hawthorne 


90  CONFESSIONS  AND  CKITICISMS. 

with  the  intuitive  skill  of  genius,  evolves  a  back 
ground,  and  produces  a  reverberation,  from  ma 
terials  which  he  may  be  said  to  have  created 
almost  as  much  as  discovered.  The  idea  of  a 
house,  founded  two  hundred  years  ago  upon  a 
crime,  remaining  ever  since  in  possession  of  its 
original  owners,  and  becoming  the  theatre,  at  last, 
of  the  judgment  upon  that  crime,  is  a  thoroughly 
picturesque  idea,  but  it  is  thoroughly  un-Ameri 
can.  Such  a  thing  might  conceivably  occur,  but 
nothing  in  this  country  could  well  be  more  un 
likely.  No  one  before  Hawthorne  had  ever 
thought  of  attempting  such  a  thing  ;  at  all  events, 
no  one  else,  before  or  since,  has  accomplished  it. 
The  preface  to  the  romance  in  question  reveals 
the  principle  upon  which  its  author  worked,  and 
incidentally  gives  a  new  definition  of  the  term 
"romance," — a  definition  of  which,  thus  far,  no 
one  but  its  propounder  has  known  how  to  avail 
himself.  It  amounts,  in  fact,  to  an  acknowledg 
ment  that  it  is  impossible  to  write  a  "novel"  of 
American  life  that  shall  be  at  once  artistic,  real 
istic,  and  profound.  A  novel,  he  says,  aims  at  a 
"very  minute  fidelity,  not  merely  to  the  possible, 
but  to  the  probable  and  ordinary  course  of  man's 
experience."  A  romance,  on  the  other  hand, 


AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION.  91 

"  while,  as  a  work  of  art,  it  must  rigidly  subject 
itself  to  laws,  and  while  it  sins  unpardonably  so 
far  as  it  may  swerve  aside  from  the  truth  of  the 
human  heart,  has  fairly  a  right  to  present  that 
truth  under  circumstances,  to  a  great  extent,  of 
the  writer's  own  choosing  or  creation.    If  he  think 
fit,  also,  he  may  so  manage  his  atmospherical  me 
dium  as  to  bring  out  and  mellow  the  lights,  and 
deepen  and  enrich  the  shadows,  of  the  picture." 
This   is   good   advice,  no    doubt,  but  not  easy  to 
follow.     We    can   all   understand,  however,  that 
the  difficulties  would   be    greatly  lessened  could 
we  but  command  backgrounds  of   the  European 
order.      Thackeray,    the    Brontes,    George    Eliot, 
and    others    have    written    great    stories,    which 
did     not     have   to    be     romances,    because     the 
literal    conditions    of    life   in    England    have    a 
picturesqueness    and   a   depth   which    correspond 
well    enough    with    whatever   moral    and    men 
tal  scenery   we    may  project   upon   them.     Haw 
thorne    was    forced     to     use     the    scenery    and 
capabilities   of    his   native    town   of    Salem.     He 
saw  that  he  could  not  present  these  in  a  realistic 
light,  and  his  artistic  instinct  showed  him  that  he 
must  modify  or  veil  the  realism  of  his  figures  in 
the  same  degree  and  manner  as  that  of  his  acces- 


92  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

series.  No  doubt,  his  peculiar  genius  and  temper 
ament  eminently  qualified  him  to  produce  this 
magical  change ;  it  was  a  remarkable  instance  of 
the  spontaneous  marriage,  so  to  speak,  of  the 
means  to  the  end ;  and  even  when,  in  Italy,  he 
had  an  opportunity  to  write  a  story  which  should 
be  accurate  in  fact,  as  well  as  faithful  to  "the  truth 
of  the  human  heart,"  he  still  preferred  a  subject 
which  bore  to  the  Italian  environment  the  same 
relation  that  the  "House  of  the  Seven  Gables" 
and  the  "  Scarlet  Letter  "  do  to  the  American  one ; 
in  other  words,  the  conception  of  Donatello  is  re 
moved  as  much  further  than  Clifford  or  Hester 
Prynne  from  literal  realism  as  the  inherent  ro 
mance  of  the  Italian  setting  is  above  that  of  New 
England.  The  whole  thing  is  advanced  a  step 
further  towards  pure  idealism,  the  relative  pro 
portions  being  maintained. 

"  The  Blithedale  Romance  "  is  only  another  in 
stance  in  point,  and  here,  as  before,  we  find  the 
principle  admirably  stated  in  the  preface.  "In 
the  old  countries,"  says  Hawthorne,  "  a  novelist's 
work  is  not  put  exactly  side  by  side  with  nature ; 
and  he  is  allowed  a  license  with  regard  to  every 
day  probability,  in  view  of  the  improved  effects 
he  is  bound  to  produce  thereby.  Among  our- 


AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION.  93 

selves,  on  the  contrary,  there  is  as  yet  no  Faery 
Land,  so  like  the  real  world  that,  in  a  suitable  re 
moteness,  we  cannot  well  tell  the  difference,  but 
with  an  atmosphere  of  strange  enchantment,  be 
held  through  which  the  inhabitants  have  a  pro 
priety  of  their  own.  This  atmosphere  is  what  the 
American  romancer  needs.  In  its  absence,  the 
beings  of  his  imagination  are  compelled  to  show 
themselves  in  the  same  category  as  actually  living 
mortals;  a  necessity  that  renders  the  paint  and 
pasteboard  of  their  composition  but  too  painfully 
discernible."  Accordingly,  Hawthorne  selects  the 
Brook  Farm  episode  (or  a  reflection  of  it)  as  af 
fording  his  drama  "a  theatre,  a  little  removed 
from  the  highway  of  ordinary  travel,  where  the 
creatures  of  his  brain  may  play  their  phantasma- 
gorical  antics,  without  exposing  them  to  too  close 
a  comparison  with  the  actual  events  of  real  lives." 
In  this  case,  therefore,  an  exceptional  circumstance 
is  made  to  answer  the  same  purpose  that  was 
attained  by  different  means  in  the  other 
romances. 

But  in  what  manner  have  our  other  writers  of 
fiction  treated  the  difficulties  that  were  thus  dealt 
with  by  Hawthorne?  —  Herman  Melville  cannot 
be  instanced  here  ;  for  his  only  novel  or  romance, 


94  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

whichever  it  be,  was  also  the  most  impossible  of 
all  his  books,  and  really  a  terrible  example  of  the 
enormities  which  a  man  of  genius  may  perpetrate 
when  working  in  a  direction  unsuited  to  him.  I 
refer,  of  course,  to  "  Pierre,  or  the  Ambiguities." 
Oliver  Wendell  Holmes's  two  delightful  stories 
are  as  favorable  examples  of  what  can  be  done,  in 
the  way  of  an  American  novel,  by  a  wise,  witty, 
and  learned  gentleman,  as  we  are  likely  to  see. 
Nevertheless,  one  cannot  avoid  the  feeling  that 
they  are  the  work  of  a  man  who  has  achieved  suc 
cess  and  found  recognition  in  other  ways  than  by 
stories,  or  even  poems  and  essays.  The  interest, 
in  either  book,  centres  round  one  of  those  physio 
logical  phenomena1  which  impinge  so  strangely 
upon  the  domain  of  the  soul ;  for  the  rest,  they 
are  simply  accurate  and  humorous  portraitures  of 
local  dialects  and  peculiarities,  and  thus  afford 
little  assistance  in  the  search  for  a  universally  ap 
plicable  rule  of  guidance.  Doctor  Holmes,  I  be 
lieve,  objects  to  having  the  term  "medicated"  ap 
plied  to  his  tales ;  but  surely  the  adjective  is  not 
reproachful ;  it  indicates  one  of  the  most  charm 
ing  and  also,  alas  !  inimitable  features  of  his  work. 
Bret  Harte  is  probably  as  valuable  a  witness  as 
could  be  summoned  in  this  case.  His  touch  is 


AMERICANISM  IN  FICTION.  95 

realistic,  and  yet  his  imagination  is  poetic  and  ro 
mantic.  He  has  discovered  something.  He  has 
done  something  both  new  and  good.  Within  the 
space  of  some  fifty  pages,  he  has  painted  a  series 
of  pictures  which  will  last  as  long  as  anything  in 
the  fifty  thousand  pages  of  Dickens.  Taking 
"The  Outcasts  of  Poker  Flat"  as  perhaps  the 
most  nearly  perfect  of  the  tales,  as  well  as  the 
most  truly  representative  of  the  writer's  powers, 
let  us  try  to  guess  its  secret.  In  the  first  place,  it 
is  very  short,  —  a  single  episode,  succinctly  and 
eloquently  told.  The  descriptions  of  scenery  and 
persons  are  masterly  and  memorable.  The  char 
acters  of  these  persons,  their  actions,  and  the  cir 
cumstances  of  their  lives,  are  as  rugged,  as  gro 
tesque,  as  terrible,  and  also  as  beautiful,  as  the 
scenery.  Thus  an  artistic  harmony  is  established, 
-the  thing  which  is  lacking  in  so  much  of  our 
literature.  The  story  moves  swiftly  on,  through 
humor,  pathos,  and  tragedy,  to  its  dramatic  close. 
It  is  given  with  perfect  literary  taste,  and  naught 
in  its  phases  of  human  nature  is  either  extenuated 
or  set  down  in  malice.  The  little  narrative  can 
be  read  in  a  few  minutes,  and  can  never  be  for 
gotten.  But  it  is  only  an  episode  ;  and  it  is  an 
episode  of  an  episode,  —  that  of  the  Californian 


96  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

gold-fever.  The  story  of  the  Argonauts  is  only 
one  story,  after  all,  and  these  tales  of  Harte's  are 
but  so  many  facets  of  the  same  gem.  They  are 
not,  however,  like  chapters  in  a  romance ;  there  is 
no  such  vital  connection  between  them  as  devel 
ops  a  cumulative  force.  We  are  no  more  im 
pressed  after  reading  half  a  dozen  of  them  than 
after  the  first;  they  are  variations  of  the  same 
theme.  They  discover  to  us  no  new  truth  about 
human  nature  ;  they  only  show  us  certain  human 
beings  so  placed  as  to  act  out  their  naked  selves, 
—  to  be  neither  influenced  nor  protected  by  the 
rewards  and  screens  of  conventional  civilization. 
The  affectation  and  insincerity  of  our  daily  life 
make  such  a  spectacle  fresh  and  pleasing  to  us. 
But  we  enjoy  it  because  of  its  unexpectedness, 
its  separateness,  its  unlikeness  to  the  ordinary 
course  of  existence.  It  is  like  a  huge,  strange, 
gorgeous  flower,  an  exaggeration  and  intensifica 
tion  of  such  flowers  as  we  know;  but  a  flower 
without  roots,  unique,  never  to  be  reproduced. 
It  is  fitting  that  its  portrait  should  be  painted; 
but,  once  done,  it  is  done  with  ;  we  cannot  fill 
our  picture-gallery  with  it.  Carlyle  wrote  the 
History  of  the  French  Revolution,  and  Bret  Harte 
has  written  the  History  of  the  Argonauts  ;  but  it 


AMERICANISM  IN   FICTION.  97 

is  absurd  to  suppose   that   a   national   literature 
could  be  founded  on  either  episode. 

But  though  Mr.  Harte  has  not  left  his  fellow- 
craftsmen  anything  to  gather  from  the  lode  which 
he    opened   and   exhausted,   we   may   still   learn 
something  from  his  method.     He  took  things  as 
he  found  them,  and  he  found  them  disinclined  to 
weave  themselves  into  an  elaborate  and  balanced 
narrative.     He  recognized  the  deficiency  of  histor 
ical  perspective,  but  he  saw  that  what  was  lost  in 
slowly  growing,  culminating  power  was  gained  in 
vivid,  instant  force.     The  deeds  of  his  character 
could  not  be  represented  as  the   final   result   of 
long-inherited  proclivities  ;  but  they  could  appear 
between  their  motive  and  their  consequence,  like 
the  draw — aim  —  fire !  of  the  Western  desperado, — 
as  short,  sharp,  and  conclusive.    In  other  words,  the 
conditions  of  American  life,  as  he  saw  it,  justified  ' 
a  short  story,  or  any  number  of  them,  but  not  a 
novel ;  and  the  fact  that  he   did   afterwards   at 
tempt  a  novel  only  served  to  confirm  his  original  < 
position.     I  think  that  the  limitation  that  he  dis 
covered  is  of  much  wider  application  than  we  are 
prone  to  realize.     American  life  has  been,  as  yet, 
nothing  but  a  series  of  episodes,  of  experiments. 
There  has   been   no   such   thing   as   a  fixed  and 


98  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

settled  condition  of  society,  not  subject  to  change 
itself,  and  therefore  affording  a  foundation  and 
contrast  to  minor  or  individual  vicissitudes.  We 
cannot  write  American-grown  novels,  because  a 
novel  is  not  an  episode,  nor  an  aggregation  of 
episodes ;  we  cannot  write  romances  in  the  Haw 
thorne  sense,  because,  as  yet,  we  do  not  seem  to 
be  clever  enough.  Several  courses  are,  however, 
1  open  to  us,  and  we  are  pursuing  them  all.  First, 
'  we  are  writing  "  short  stories,"  accounts  of  epi- 
•  sodes  needing  no  historical  perspective,  and  not 
'caring  for  any;  and,  so  far  as  one  may  judge, 
we  write  the  best  short  stories  in  the  world. 
Secondly,  we  may  spin  out  our  short  stories  into 
long-short  stories,  just  as  we  may  imagine  a  baby 
six  feet  high  ;  it  takes  up  more  room,  but  is  just  as 
much  a  baby  as  one  of  twelve  inches.  Thirdly, 
we  may  graft  our  flower  of  romance  on  a  Euro 
pean  stem,  and  enjoy  ourselves  as  much  as  the 
European  novelists  do,  and  with  as  clear  a  con 
science.  We  are  stealing  that  which  enriches  us 
and  does  not  impoverish  them.  It  is  silly  arid 
childish  to  make  the  boundaries  of  the  America  of 
the  mind  coincide  with  those  of  the  United  States. 
We  need  not  dispute  about  free  trade  and  protec 
tion  here ;  literature  is  not  commerce,  nor  is  it 


AMERICANISM   IX   FICTION.  99 

politics.  America  is  not  a  petty  nationality,  like 
France,  England,  and  Germany ;  but  whatever  in 
such  nationalities  tends  toward  enlightenment 
and  freedom  is  American.  Let  us  not,  therefore, 
confirm  ourselves  in  a  false  and  ignoble  concep 
tion  of  our  meaning  and  mission  in  the  world. 
Let  us  not  carry  into  the  temple  of  the  Muse  the 
jealousies,  the  prejudice,  the  ignorance,  the  selfish 
ness  of  our  "  Senate  "  and  "  Representatives," 
strangely  so  called !  Let  us  not  refuse  to  breathe 
the  air  of  Heaven,  lest  there  be  something  Euro 
pean  or  Asian  in  it.  If  we  cannot  have  a  national 
literature  in  the  narrow,  geographical  sense  of  the 
phrase,  it  is  because  our  inheritance  transcends  all 
geographical  definitions.  The  great  American 
novel  may  not  be  written  this  year,  or  even  in 
this  century.  Meanwhile,  let  us  not  fear  to  ride, 
and  ride  to  death,  whatever  species  of  Pegasus  we 
can  catch.  It  can  do  us  no  harm,  and  it  may  help 
us  to  acquire  a  firmer  seat  against  the  time  when 
our  own,  our  very  own  winged  steed  makes  his 
appearance. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

LITERATURE  FOR  CHILDREN. 

LITERATURE  is  that  quality  in  books  which  af 
fords  delight  and  nourishment  to  the  soul.  But 
this  is  a  scientific  and  skeptical  age,  insomuch 
that  one  hardly  ventures  to  take  for  granted  that 
every  reader  will  know  what  his  soul  is.  It  is  not 
the  intellect,  though  it  gives  the  intellect  light; 
nor  the  emotions,  though  they  receive  their 
warmth  from  it.  It  is  the  most  catholic  and  con 
stant  element  of  human  nature,  yet  it  bears  no  di 
rect  part  in  the  practical  affairs  of  life;  it  does 
not  struggle,  it  dt>es  not  even  suffer ;  but  merely 
emerges  or  retires,  glows  or  congeals,  according  to 
the  company  in  which  it  finds  itself.  We  might 
say  that  the  soul  is  a  name  for  man's  innate  sym 
pathy  with  goodness  and  truth  in  the  abstract; 
for  no  man  can  have  a  bad  soul,  though  his  heart 
may  be  evil,  or  his  mind  depraved,  because  the 
soul's  access  to  the  mind  or  heart  has  been  so 
obstructed  as  to  leave  the  moral  consciousness 

100 


LITERATURE  FOR   CHILDREN.  101 

cold  and  dark.  The  soul,  in  other  words,  is  the 
only  conservative  and  peacemaker ;  it  affords  the 
only  unalterable  ground  upon  which  all  men  can 
always  meet;  it  unselfishly  indentifies  or  unites 
us  with  our  fellows,  in  contradistinction  to  the 
selfish  intellect,  which  individualizes  us  and  sets 
each  man  against  every  other.  Doubtless,  then, 
the  soul  is  an  amiable  and  desirable  possession, 
and  it  would  be  a  pity  to  deprive  it  of  so  much 
encouragement  as  may  be  compatible  with  due  at 
tention  to  the  serious  business  of  life.  For  there 
are  moments,  even  in  the  most  active  careers, 
when  it  seems  agreeable  to  forget  competition, 
rivalry,  jealousy  ;  when  it  is  a  rest  to  think  of  one's 
self  as  a  man  rather  than  a  person;  —  moments 
when  time  and  place  appear  impertinent,  and  that 
most  profitable  which  affords  least  palpable  profit. 
At  such  seasons,  a  man  looks  inward,  or,  as  the 
American  poet  puts  it,  he  loafs  and  invites  his 
soul,  and  then  he  is  at  a  disadvantage  if  his  soul, 
in  consequence  of  too  persistent  previous  neglect, 
declines  to  respond  to  the  invitation,  and  remains 
immured  in  that  secret  place  which,  as  years  pass  by, 
becomes  less  and  less  accessible  to  so  many  of  us. 

When  I  say  that  literature  nourishes  the  soul,  I 
implicitly  refuse  the  title  of  literature  to  anything 


102  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

in  books  that  either  directly  or  indirectly  promotes 
any  worldly  or  practical  use.  Of  course,  what  is 
literature  to  one  man  may  be  anything  but  litera 
ture  to  another,  or  to  the  same  man  under  dif 
ferent  circumstances;  Virgil  to  the  schoolboy, 
for  instance,  is  a  very  different  thing  from  the 
Virgil  of  the  scholar.  But  whatever  you  read 
with  the  design  of  improving  yourself  in  some 
profession,  or  of  acquiring  information  likely  to 
be  of  advantage  to  you  in  any  pursuit  or  contin 
gency,  or  of  enabling  yourself  to  hold  your  own 
with  other  readers,  or  even  of  rendering  yourself 
that  enviable  nondescript,  a  person  of  culture, — 
whatever,  in  short,  is  read  with  any  assignable 
purpose  whatever,  is  in  so  far  not  literature.  The 
Bible  may  be  literature  to  Mr.  Matthew  Arnold, 
because  he  reads  it  for  fun ;  but  to  Luther,  Cal 
vin,  or  the  pupils  of  a  Sunday-school,  it  is  essen 
tially  something  else.  Literature  is  the  written 
communications  of  the  soul  of  mankind  with  it 
self;  it  is  liable  to  appear  in  the  most  unexpected 
places,  and  in  the  oddest  company ;  it  vanishes 
when  we  would  grasp  it,  and  appears  when  we 
look  not  for  it.  Chairs  of  literature  are  estab 
lished  in  the  great  universities,  and  it  is  liter 
ature,  no  doubt,  that  the  professor  discourses ;  but 


LITERATURE  FOR   CHILDREN.  103 

it  ceases  to  be  literature  before  it  reaches  the 
student's  ear;  though,  again,  when  the  same 
students  stumble  across  it  in  the  recesses  of  their 
memory  ten  or  twenty  years  later,  it  may  have  be 
come  literature  once  more.  Finally,  literature 
may,  upon  occasion,  avail  a  man  more  than  the 
most  thorough  technical  information ;  but  it  will 
not  be  because  it  supplements  or  supplants  that 
information,  but  because  it  has  so  tempered  and 
exalted  his  general  faculty  that  whatever  he  may 
do  is  done  more  clearly  and  comprehensively  than 
might  otherwise  be  the  case. 

Having  thus,  in  some  measure,  considered  what 
is  literature  and  what  the  soul,  let  us  note, 
further,  that  the  literature  proper  to  manhood  is 
not  proper  to  childhood,  though  the  reverse  is  not 
—  or,  at  least,  never  ought  to  be  —  true.  In 
childhood,  the  soul  and  the  mind  act  in  harmony ; 
the  mind  has  not  become  preoccupied  or  sophisti 
cated  by  so-called  useful  knowledge ;  it  responds 
obediently  to  the  soul's  impulses  and  intuitions. 
Children  have  no  morality;  they  have  not  yet 
descended  to  the  level  where  morality  suggests  it 
self  to  them.  For  morality  is  the  outcome  of 
spiritual  pride,  the  most  stubborn  and  insidious  of 
all  sins ;  the  pride  which  prompts  each  of  us  to 


104  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

declare  himself  holier  than  his  fellows,  and  to 
support  that  claim  by  parading  his  docility  to  the 
Decalogue.  Docility  to  any  set  of  rules,  no  mat 
ter  of  how  divine  authority,  so  long  as  it  is 
inspired  by  hope  of  future  good  or  present  advan 
tage,  is  rather  worse  than  useless :  except  our 
righteousness  exceed  that  of  the  Scribes  and 
Pharisees, —  that  is,  except  it  be  spontaneous 
righteousness  or  morality,  and,  therefore,  not 
morality,  but  unconscious  goodness, —  we  shall  in 
no  wise  have  benefited  either  ourselves  or  others. 
Children,  when  left  to  themselves,  artlessly  and 
innocently  act  out  the  nature  that  is  common 
to  saint  and  sinner  alike ;  they  are  selfish,  angry, 
and  foolish,  because  their  state  is  human ;  and 
they  are  loving,  truthful,  and  sincere,  because 
their  origin  is  divine.  All  that  pleases  or  agrees 
with  them  is  good ;  all  that  opposes  or  offends 
them  is  evil,  and  this,  without  any  reference  what 
ever  to  the  moral  code  in  vogue  among  their 
elders.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  children  cannot 
be  tempted  as  we  are,  because  they  suppose  that 
everything  is  free  and  possible,  and  because 
they  are  as  yet  uncontaminated  by  the  artifi 
cial  cravings  which  the  artificial  prohibitions  in 
cident  to  our  civilization  create.  Life  is  to  them 


LITERATURE  FOR   CHILDREN.  105 

a  constantly  widening  circle  of  things  to  be  had 
and  enjoyed ;  nor  does  it  ever  occur  to  them  that 
their  desires  can  conflict  with  those  of  others,  or 
with  the  laws  of  the  universe.  They  cannot 
consciously  do  wrong,  rior  understand  that  any 
one  else  can  do  so  ;  untoward  accidents  may  hap 
pen,  but  inanimate  nature  is  just  as  liable  to  be 
objectionable  in  this  respect  as  human  beings : 
the  stone  that  trips  them  up,  the  thorn  that 
scratches  them,  the  snow  that  makes  their  flesh 
tingle,  is  an  object  of  their  resentment  in  just  the 
same  kind  and  degree  as  are  the  men  and  women 
who  thwart  or  injure  them.  But  of  duty  —  that 
dreary  device  to  secure  future  reward  by  present 
suffering ;  of  conscientiousness  —  that  fear  of  pres 
ent  good  for  the  sake  of  future  punishment ;  of 
remorse  —  that  "disavowal  of  past  pleasure  for  fear 
of  the  sting  in  its  tail;  of  ambition  —  that  be 
grudging*  of  all  honorable  results  that  are  not  ef 
fected  by  one's  self ;  of  these,  and  all  similar  politic 
and  arbitrary  masks  of  self-love  and  pusillanimity, 
these  poor  children  know  and  suspect  nothing. 
Yet  their  eyes  are  much  keener  than  ours,  for 
they  see  through  the  surface  of  nature  and  per 
ceive  its  symbolism ;  they  see  the  living  reality, 
of  which  n  ature  is  the  veil,  and  are  continually  at 


106  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

fault  because  this  veil  is  not,  after  all,  the  reality, 
—  because  it  is  fixed  and  unplastic.  The  "  deep 
mind  of  dauntless  infancy "  is,  in  fact,  the  only 
revelation  we  have,  except  divine  revelation  it 
self,  of  that  pure  and  natural  life  of  man  which 
we  dream  of,  and  liken  to  heaven;  but  we, 
nevertheless,  in  our  penny-wise,  pound-foolish 
way,  insist  upon  regarding  it  as  ignorance,  and  do 
our  best,  from  the  earliest  possible  moment,  to 
disenchant  and  dispel  it.  We  call  the  outrage 
education,  understanding  thereby  the  process  of  ex 
terminating  in  the  child  the  higher  order  of  facul 
ties  and  the  intuitions,  and  substituting  for  them 
the  external  memory,  timidity,  self-esteem,  and  all 
that  armament  of  petty  weapons  and  defences 
which  may  enable  us  to  get  the  better  of  our 
fellow-creatures  in  this  world,  and  receive  the  re 
ward  of  our  sagacity  in  the  next.  The  success  of 
our  efforts  is  pitiably  complete ;  for  though  the 
child,  if  fairly  engaged  in  single  combat,  might 
make  a  formidable  resistance  against  the  infliction 
of  "  lessons,"  it  cannot  long  withstand  our  crafty 
device  of  sending  it  to  a  place  where  it  sees  a 
score  or  a  hundred  of  little  victims  like  itself,  all 
being  driven  to  the  same  Siberia.  The  spirit  of 
emulation  is  aroused,  and  lo !  away  they  all 


LITERATURE  FOR  CHILDREN.       107 

scamper,  each  straining  its  utmost  to  reach  the 
barren  goal  ahead  of  all  competitors.  So  do  we 
make  the  most  ignoble  passions  of  our  children 
our  allies  in  the  unholy  task  of  divesting  them  of 
their  childhood.  And  yet,  who  is  not  aware  that 
the  best  men  the  world  has  seen  have  been  those 
who,  throughout  their  lives,  retained  the  aroma  of 
childlike  simplicity  which  they  brought  with  them 
into  existence?  Learning  —  the  acquisition  of 
specific  facts  —  is  not  wisdom ;  it  is  almost  incom 
patible  with  wisdom ;  indeed,  unless  the  mind  be 
powerful  enougli  not  only  to  fuse  its  facts,  but  to 
vaporize  them, —  to  sublimate  them  into  an  impal 
pable  atmosphere, —  they  will  stand  in  wisdom's 
way.  Wisdom  comes  from  the  pondering  and  the 
application  to  life  of  certain  truths  quite  above 
the  sphere  of  facts,  and  of  infinitely  more  moment 
and  less  complexity, —  truths  which  are  often 
found  to  be  in  accordance  with  the  spiritual  in 
stinct  called  intuition,  which  children  possess 
more  fully  than  grown  persons.  The  wisdom  of 
our  children  would  often  astonish  us,  if  we  would 
only  forbear  the  attempt  to  make  them  knowing, 
and  submissively  accept  instruction  from  them. 
Through  all  the  imperfection  of  their  inherited  in 
firmity,  we  shall  ever  and  anon  be  conscious  of 


108  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

the  radiance  of  a  beautiful,  unconscious  intelli 
gence,  worth  more  than  the  smartness  of  schools 
and  the  cleverness  of  colleges.  But  no  ;  we  abhor 
the  very  notion  of  it,  and  generally  succeed  in  ex 
tinguishing  it  long  before  the  Three  R's  are  done 
with. 

And  yet,  by  wisely  directing  the  child's  use  of 
the  first  of  the  Three,  much  of  the  ill  effects  of  the 
trio  and  their  offspring  might  be  counteracted.  If 
we  believed  —  if  the  great  mass  of  people  known 
as  the  civilized  world  did  actually  and  livingly  be 
lieve  —  that  there  was  really  anything  beyond  or 
above  the  physical  order  of  nature,  our  children's 
literature,  wrongly  so  called,  would  not  be  what  it 
is.  We  believe  what  we  can  see  and  touch ;  we 
teach  them  to  believe  the  same,  and,  not  satisfied 
with  that,  we  sedulously  warn  them  not  to  believe 
anything  else.  The  child,  let  us  suppose,  has  heard 
from  some  unauthorized  person  that  there  are 
fairies  —  little  magical  creatures  an  inch  high,  up 
to  all  manner  of  delightful  feats.  He  compre 
hends  the  whole  matter  at  half  a  word,  feels  that 
he  had  known  it  already,  and  half  thinks  that  he 
sees  one  or  two  on  his  way  home.  He  runs  up  to 
his  mother  and  tells  her  about  it;  and  has  she 
ever  seen  fairies  ?  Alas !  His  mother  tells  him 


LITERATURE  FOR  CHILDREN.  109 

that  the  existence  of  such  a  being  as  a  fairy  is 
impossible.  In  old  times,  when  the  world  was 
very  ignorant  and  superstitious,  they  used  to 
ascribe  everything  that  happened  to  supernatural 
agency ;  even  the  trifling  daily  accidents  of  one's 
life,  such  as  tumbling  down  stairs,  or  putting  the 
right  shoe  on  the  left  foot,  were  thought  or  fan 
cied  to  be  the  work  of  some  mysterious  power; 
and  since  ignorant  people  are  very  apt  to  imagine 
they  see  what  they  believe  [proceeds  this  mother] 
instead  of  only  believing  what  they  see;  and 
since,  furthermore,  ignorance  disposes  to  exag 
geration  and  thus  to  untruth,  these  people  ended 
by  asserting  that  they  saw  fairies.  "Now,  my 
child,"  continues  the  parent,  "  it  would  grieve  me 
to  see  you  the  victim  of  such  folly.  Do  not  read 
fairy  stories.  They  are  not  true  to  life ;  they  fill 
your  mind  with  idle  notions;  they  cannot  form 
your  understanding,  or  aid  you  to  do  your  work  in 
the  world.  If  you  should  happen  to  fall  in  with 
such  fables,  be  careful  as  you  read  to  bear  in  mind 
that  they  are  pure  inventions  —  pretty,  sometimes, 
perhaps,  but  essentially  frivolous,  if  not  immoral. 
You  have,  however,  thanks  to  the  enlightened 
enterprise  of  writers  and  publishers,  an  endless  as 
sortment  of  juvenile  books  and  periodicals  which 


110  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

combine  legitimate  amusement  with  sound  and 
trustworthy  instruction.  Here  are  stories  about 
little  children,  just  like  yourself,  who  talk  and  act 
just  as  you  do,  and  to  whom  nothing  supernatural 
or  outlandish  ever  happens ;  and  whose  adven 
tures,  when  you  have  read  them,  convey  to  you 
some  salutary  moral  lesson.  What  more  can  you 
want?  Yes,  very  likely  'Grimm's  Tales'  and 
'  The  Arabian  Nights  '  may  seem  more  attractive  ; 
but  in  this  world  many  harmful  things  put  on  an 
inviting  guise,  which  deceives  the  inexperienced 
eye.  May  my  child  remember  that  all  is  not  gold 
that  glitters,  and  desire,  not  what  is  diverting 
merely,  but  what  is  useful  and  .  .  .  and  con 
ventional  ! " 

Let  us  admit  that,  things  being  as  they  are,  it 
is  necessary  to  develop  the  practical  side  of  the 
child's  nature,  to  ground  him  in  moral  principles, 
and  to  make  him  comprehend  and  fear  —  nomi 
nally  God,  but  really  —  society.  But  why,  in 
addition  to  doing  this,  should  we  strangle  the 
unpractical  side  of  his  nature,  —  the  ideal,  imag 
inative,  spiritual  side,  —  the  side  which  alone  can 
determine  his  value  or  worthlessness  in  eternity? 
If  our  minds  were  visible  as  our  bodies  are,  we 
should  behold  on  every  side  of  us,  and  in  our  own 


LITERATURE  FOR  CHILDREN.       Ill 

private  looking-glasses,  such  abortions,  cripples, 
and  monstrosities  as  all  the  slums  of  Europe  and 
the  East  could  not  parallel.  We  pretend  to  make 
little  men  and  women  out  of  our  children,  and  we 
make  little  dwarfs  and  hobgoblins  out  of  them. 
Moreover,  we  should  not  diminish  even  the  prac 
tical  efficiency  of  the  coming  generation  by  reject 
ing  their  unpractical  side.  Whether  this  boy's 
worldly  destination  be  to  clean  a  stable  or  to  rep 
resent  his  country  at  a  foreign  court,  he  will  do 
his  work  all  the  better,  instead  of  worse,  for  hav 
ing  been  allowed  freedom  of  expansion  on  the 
ideal  plane.  He  will  do  it  comprehensively,  or 
as  from  above  downward,  instead  of  blindly,  or  as 
from  below  upward.  To  a  certain  extent,  this 
position  is  very  generally  admitted  by  instructors 
nowadays;  but  the  admission  bears  little  or  no 
fruit.  The  ideality  and  imagination  which  they 
have  in  mind  are  but  a  partial  and  feeble  imitation 
of  what  is  really  signified  by  those  terms.  Ideality 
and  imagination  are  themselves  merely  the  symp 
tom  or  expression  of  the  faculty  and  habit  of 
spiritual  or  subjective  intuition — a  faculty  of  par 
amount  value  in  life,  though  of  late  years,  in  the 
rush  of  rational  knowledge  and  discovery,  it  has 
fallen  into  neglect.  But  it  is  by  means  of  this 


112  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

faculty  alone  that  the  great  religion  of  India  was 
constructed  —  the  most  elaborate  and  seductive 
of  all  systems ;  and  although  as  a  faith  Buddhism 
is  also  the  most  treacherous  and  dangerous  attack 
ever  made  upon  the  immortal  welfare  of  mankind, 
that  circumstance  certainly  does  not  discredit  or 
invalidate  the  claim  to  importance  of  spiritual 
intuition  itself.  It  may  be  objected  that  spiritual 
intuition  is  a  vague  term.  It  undoubtedly  be 
longs  to  an  abstruse  region  of  psychology ;  but  its 
meaning  for  our  present  purpose  is  simply  the  act 
of  testing  questions  of  the  moral  consciousness  by 
an  inward  touchstone  of  truth,  instead  of  by  ex 
ternal  experience  or  information.  That  the  exist 
ence  of  such  a  touchstone  should  be  ridiculed  by 
those  who  are  accustomed  to  depend  for  their  be 
lief  upon  palpable  or  logical  evidence,  goes  with 
out  saying ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  there  need  be 
no  collision  or  argument  on  the  point,  since  no 
question  with  which  intuition  is  concerned  can 
ever  present  itself  to  persons  who  pin  their  faith 
to  the  other  sort  of  demonstration.  The  reverse 
of  this  statement  is  by  no  means  true;  but  it 
would  lead  us  out  of  our  present  path  to  discuss 
the  matter. 

Assuming,  however,  that  intuition  is  possible, 


LITERATURE  FOR   CHILDREN.  113 

it  is  evident  that  it  should  exist  in  children  in  an 
extremely  pure,  if  not  in  its  most  potent  state ; 
and  to  deny  it  opportunity  of  development  might 
fairly  be  called  a  barbarity.  It  will  hardly  be 
disputed  that  children  are  an  important  element 
in  society.  Without  them  we  should  lose  the 
memory  of  our  youth,  and  all  opportunity  for  the 
exercise  of  unselfish  and  disinterested  affection. 
Life  would  become  arid  and  mechanical  to  a  de 
gree  now  scarcely  conceivable ;  chastity  and  all 
the  human  virtues  would  cease  to  exist ;  marriage 
would  be  an  aimless  and  absurd  transaction ;  and 
the  brotherhood  of  man,  even  in  the  nominal 
sense  that  it  now  exists,  would  speedily  be  ab 
jured.  Political  economy  and  sociology  neglect 
to  make  children  an  element  in  their  arguments 
and  deductions,  and  no  small  part  of  their  error  is 
attributable  to  that  circumstance.  But  although 
children  still  are  born,  and  all  the  world  acknowl 
edges  their  paramount  moral  and  social  value,  the 
general  tendency  of  what  we  are  forced  to  call 
education  at  the  present  day  is  to  shorten  as 
much  as  possible  the  period  of  childhood.  In 
America  and  Germany  especially  —  but  more  in 
America  than  in  Germany  —  children  are  urged 
and  stimulated  to  "  grow  up  "  almost  before  they 


114  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

have  been  short-coated.  That  conceptions  of 
order  and  discipline  should  be  early  instilled  into 
them  is  proper  enough ;  but  no  other  order  and 
discipline  seems  to  be  contemplated  by  educators 
than  the  forcing  them  to  stand  and  be  stuffed  full 
of  indigestible  and  incongruous  knowledge,  than 
^which  proceeding  nothing  more  disorderly  could 
]be  devised.  It  looks  as  if  we  felt  the  innocence 
and  naturalness  of  our  children  to  be  a  rebuke  to 
us,  and  wished  to  do  away  with  it  in  short  order. 
There  is  something  in  the  New  Testament  about 
offending  the  little  ones,  and  the  preferred  alter 
native  thereto ;  and  really  we  are  outraging  not 
only  the  objective  child,  but  the  subjective  one 
also  —  that  in  ourselves,  namely,  which  is  inno 
cent  and  pure,  and  without  which  we  had  better 
not  be  at  all.  Now  I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  the 
only  medicine  that  can  cure  this  malady  is  legiti 
mate  children's  literature ;  wise  parents  are  also 
very  useful,  though  not  perhaps  so  generally  avail 
able.  My  present  contention  is  that  the  right 
sort  of  literature  is  an  agent  of  great  efficiency, 
and  may  be  very  easily  come  by.  Children  derive 
more  genuine  enjoyment  and  profit  from  a  good 
book  than  most  grown  people  are  susceptible  of: 
thjey  see  what  is  described,  and  themselves  enact 


LITERATURE  FOR  CHILDREN.  115 

and  perfect  the  characters  of  the  story  as  it  goes 
along. 

Nor  is  it  indispensable  that  literature  of  the 
kind  required  should  forthwith  be  produced;  a 
great  deal,  of  admirable  quality,  is  already  on 
hand.  There  are  a  few  great  poems  —  Spenser's 
"  Faerie  Queene  "  is  one  —  which  no  well  regu 
lated  child  should  be  without;  but  poetry  in 
general  is  not  exactly  what  we  want.  Children 
—  healthy  children  —  never  have  the  poetic  ge 
nius  ;  but  they  are  born  mystics,  and  they  have 
the  sense  of  humor.  The  best  way  to  speak  to 
them  is  in  prose,  and  the  best  kind  of  prose  is  the 
symbolic.  The  hermetic  philosophers  of  the  Mid 
dle  Ages  are  probably  the  authors  of  some  of  the 
best  children's  stories  extant.  In  these  tales,  dis 
guised  beneath  what  is  apparently  the  simplest 
and  most  artless  flow  of  narrative,  profound  truths 
are  discussed  and  explained.  The  child  reads  the 
narrative,  and  certainly  cannot  be  accused  of  com 
prehending  the  hidden  philosophical  problem ;  yet 
that  also  has  its  share  in  charming  him.  The 
reason  is  partly  that  true  symbolic  or  figurative 
writing  is  the  simplest  form  known  to  literature. 
The  simplest,  that  is  to  say,  in  outward  form,  —  it 
may  be  indefinitely  abstruse  as  to  its  inward  con- 


116  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

tents.  Indeed,  the  very  cause  of  its  formal  sim 
plicity  is  its  interior  profundity.  The  principle  of 
hermetic  writing  was,  as  we  know,  to  disguise 
philosophical  propositions  and  results  under  a 
form  of  words  which  should  ostensibly  signify 
some  very  ordinary  and  trivial  thing.  It  was  a 
secret  language,  in  the  vocabulary  of  which  mate 
rial  facts  are  used  to  represent  spiritual  truths. 
But  it  differed  from  ordinary  secret  language  in 
this,  that  not  only  were  the  truths  represented  in 
the  symbols,  but  the  philosophical  development 
of  the  truth,  in  its  ramifications,  was  completely 
evolved  under  the  cover  of  a  logically  consistent 
tale.  This,  evidently,  is  a  far  higher  achievement 
of  ingenuity  than  merely  to  string  together  a 
series  of  unrelated  parts  of  speech,  which,  on 
being  tested  by  the  "  key,"  shall  discover  the  mes 
sage  or  information  really  intended.  It  is,  in  fact, 
a  practical  application  of  the  philosophical  discov 
ery,  made  by  or  communicated  to  the  hermetic 
philosophers,  that  every  material  object  in  nature 
answers  to  or  corresponds  with  a  certain  one  or 
group  of  philosophical  truths.  Viewed  in  this 
light,  the  science  of  symbols  or  of  correspondences 
ceases  to  be  an  arbitrary  device,  susceptible  of 
alteration  according  to  fancy,  and  avouches  itself 


LITERATURE  FOR  CHILDREN.       117 

an  essential  and  consistent  relation  between  the 
things  of  the  mind  and  the  things  of  the  senses. 
There  is  a  complete  mental  creation,  answering 
to  the  material  creation,  not  continuously  evolved 
from  it,  but  on  a  different  or  detached  plane. 
The  sun,  —  to  take  an  example,  —  the  source  of 
light  and  heat,  and  thereby  of  physical  nature, 
is  in  these  fables  always  the  symbol  of  God,  of 
love  and  wisdom,  by  which  the  spirit  of  man 
is  created.  Light,  then,  answers  to  wisdom, 
and  heat  to  love.  And  since  all  physical  sub 
stances  are  the  result  of  the  combined  action 
of  light  and  heat,  we  may  easily  perceive  how 
these  hermetic  sages  were  enabled  to  use  every 
physical  object  as  a  cloak  of  its  corresponding 
philosophical  truth,  —  with  no  other  liability  to 
error  than  might  result  from  the  imperfect  condi 
tion  of  their  knowledge  of  physical  laws. 

To  return,  however,  to  the  children,  I  need 
scarcely  remark  that  the  cause  of  children's  taking 
so  kindly  to  hermetic  writing  is  that  it  is  actually 
a  living  writing ;  it  is  alive  in  precisely  the  same 
way  that  nature,  or  man  himself,  is  alive.  Matter 
is  dead ;  life  organizes  and  animates  it.  And  all 
writing  is  essentially  dead  which  is  a  mere  trans 
cript  of  fact,  and  is  not  inwardly  organized  and 


118  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

vivified  by  a  spiritual  significance.  Children  do 
not  know  what  it  is  that  makes  a  human  being 
smile,  move,  and  talk ;  but  they  know  that  such  a 
phenomenon  is  infinitely  more  interesting  than  a 
doll ;  and  they  prove  it  by  themselves  supplying 
the  doll  with  speech  and  motions  out  of  their  own 
minds,  so  as  to  make  it  as  much  like  a  real  person 
as  possible.  In  the  same  way,  they  do  not  per 
ceive  the  philosophical  truth  which  is  the  cause  of 
existence  of  the  hermetic  fable  ;  but  they  find  that 
fable  far  more  juicy  and  substantial  than  the  or 
dinary  narrative  of  e very-day  facts,  because,  how 
ever  fine  the  surface  of  the  latter  may  be,  it  has, 
after  all,  nothing  but  its  surface  to  recommend  it. 
It  has  no  soul ;  it  is  not  alive  ;  and,  though  they  can 
not  explain  why,  they  feel  the  difference  between 
that  thin,  fixed  grimace  and  the  changing  smile  of 
the  living  countenance. 

It  would  scarcely  be  practicable,  however,  to 
confine  the  children's  reading  to  hermetic  litera 
ture;  for  not  much  of  it  is  extant  in  its  pure 
state.  But  it  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that  all 
fairy  stories,  and  derivations  from  these,  trace 
their  descent  from  an  hermetic  ancestry.  They 
are  often  unaware  of  their  genealogy;  but  the 
sparks  of  that  primal  vitality  are  in  them.  The 


LITERATURE  FOR  CHILDREN.       119 

fairy  is  itself  a  symbol  for   the   expression   of   a 
more  complex  and  abstract  idea ;  but,  once  having 
come  into  existence,  and  being,  not  a  pure  symbol, 
but  a  hybrid  between  the  symbol  and  that   for 
which  it  stands,  it  presently  began   an  independ 
ent  career  of  its  own.       The  mediaeval  imagina 
tion  went  to  work  with  it,  found  it  singularly  and 
delightfully  plastic  to  its  touch  and  requirements, 
and  soon  made  it  the  centre  of  a  new  and  charm 
ing  world,  in  which  a  whole  army  of  graceful  and 
romantic  fancies,  which  are  always  in  quest  of  an 
arena  in  which  to  disport  themselves  before  the 
mind,     found     abundant     accommodation     and 
nourishment.     The  fairy  land  of  mediaeval  Chris 
tianity  seems  to  us  the   most   satisfactory   of   all 
fairy  lands,  probably  because  it  is  more  in  accord 
with  our  genius  and  prejudices  than  those  of  the 
East ;  and  it  fitted  in  so  aptly  with  the  popular 
mediaeval    ignorance    on  the   subject   of  natural 
phenomena,  that  it  became  actually  an  article   of 
belief  with  the  mass  of  men,  who  trembled  at  it 
while  they  invented  it,  in  the  most  delicious  im 
aginable  state  of   enchanted   alarm.     All   this   is 
prime    reading  for  children ;   because,  though   it 
does  not  carry  an  orderly  spiritual  meaning  within 
it,  it  is  more  spiritual  than  material,  and  is  con- 


120  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

structed  entirely  according  to  the  dictates  of  an 
exuberant  and  richly  colored,  but,  nevertheless,  in 
its  own  sphere,  legitimate  imagination.  Indeed, 
fairy  land,  though  as  it  were  accidentally  created, 
has  the  same  permanent  right  to  be  that  Beauty 
has;  it  agrees  with  a  genuine  aspect  of  human 
nature,  albeit  one  much  discountenanced  just  at 
present.  The  sequel  to  it,  in  which  romantic 
human  personages  are  accredited  with  fairy-like 
attributes,  as  in  the  "  Faerie  Queene,"  already  al 
luded  to,  is  a  step  in  the  wrong  direction,  but  not 
a  step  long  enough  to  carry  us  altogether  outside 
of  the  charmed  circle.  The  child's  instinct  of 
selection  being  vast  and  cordial, —  he  will  make  a 
grain  of  true  imagination  suffuse  and  glorify  a 
whole  acre  of  twaddle, —  we  may  with  security 
leave  him  in  that  fantastic  society.  Moreover, 
some  children  being  less  imaginative  than  others, 
and  all  children  being  less  imaginative  in  some 
moods  and  conditions  than  at  other  seasons,  the 
elaborate  compositions  of  Tasso,  Cervantes,  and 
the  others,  though  on  the  boundary  line  between 
what  is  meat  for  babes  and  the  other  sort  of 
meat,  have  also  their  abiding  use. 

The   "  Arabian  Nights "  introduced  us   to  the 
domain  of  the  Oriental  imagination,  and  has  done 


LITERATURE  FOR   CHILDREN.  121 

more  than  all  the  books  of  travel  in  the  East  to 
make  us  acquainted  with  the  Asiatic  character 
and  its  differences  from  our  own.  From  what  has 
already  been  said  on  the  subject  of  spiritual  intui 
tion  in  relation  to  these  races,  one  is  prepared  to 
find  that  all  the  Eastern  literature  that  has  any 
value  is  hermetic  writing,  and  therefore,  in  so  far, 
proper  for  children.  But  the  incorrigible  subtlety 
of  the  Oriental  intellect  has  vitiated  much  of 
their  symbology,  and  the  sentiment  of  sheer 
wonder  is  stimulated  rather  than  that  of  orderly 
imagination.  To  read  the  "  Arabian  Nights  "  or 
the  "  Bhagavad-Gita "  is  a  sort  of  dissipation ; 
upon  the  unhackneyed  mind  of  the  child  it  leaves 
a  reactionary  sense  of  depression.  The  life  which 
it  embodies  is  distorted,  over-colored,  and  excit 
ing  ;  it  has  not  the  serene  and  balanced  power  of 
the  Western  productions.  Moreover,  these  books 
were  not  written  with  the  grave  philosophic  pur 
pose  that  animated  our  own  hermetic  school ;  it  is 
rather  a  sort  of  jugglery  practised  with  the  sub 
ject —  an  exercise  of  ingenuity  and  invention  for 
their  own  sake.  It  indicates  a  lack  of  the  feeling 
of  responsibility  on  the  writers'  part, —  a  result, 
doubtless,  of  the  prevailing  fatalism  that  under 
lies  all  their  thought.  It  is  not  essentially  whole- 


122  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

some,  in  short ;  but  it  is  immeasurably  superior  to 
the  best  of  the  productions  called  forth  by  our 
modern  notions  of  what  should  be  given  to  chil 
dren  to  read. 

But  I  can  do  no  more  than  touch  upon  this 
branch  of  the  subject ;  nor  will  it  be  possible  to 
linger  long  over  the  department  of  our  own  liter 
ature  which  came  into  being  with  "Robinson 
Crusoe."  No  theory  as  to  children's  books  would 
be  worth  much  attention  which  found  itself 
obliged  to  exclude  that  memorable  work.  Al 
though  it  submits  in  a  certain  measure  to  classi 
fication,  it  is  almost  sui  generis ;  no  book  of  its 
kind,  approaching  it  in  merit,  has  ever  been  writ 
ten.  In  what,  then,  does  its  fascination  consist  ? 
There  is  certainly  nothing  hermetic  about  it ;  it  is 
the  simplest  and  most  studiously  matter-of-fact 
narrative  of  events,  comprehensible  without  the 
slightest  effort,  and  having  no  meaning  that  is  not 
apparent  on  the  face  of  it.  And  yet  children,  and 
grown  people  also,  read  it  again  and  again,  and 
cannot  find  it  uninteresting.  I  think  the  phenom 
enon  may  largely  be  due  to  the  nature  of  the 
subject,  which  is  really  of  primary  and  universal 
interest  to  mankind.  It  is  the  story  of  the  strug 
gle  of  man  with  wild  and  hostile  nature, —  in  the 


LITERATURE  FOR  CHILDREN.       123 

larger  sense  an  elementary  theme, —  his  shifts,  his 
failures,  his  perils,  his  fears,  his   hopes,  his    suc 
cesses.     The  character  of  Robinson  is  so  artfully 
generalized   or   universalized,  and   sympathy  for 
him  is  so  powerfully  aroused  and  maintained,  that 
the  reader,  especially  the  child  reader,  inevitably 
identifies  himself  with  him,  and  feels  his  emotions 
and  struggles  as  his  own.     The  ingredient  of  sus 
pense  is  never  absent  from  the  story,  and  the  ab 
sence  of  any  plot  prevents  us  from  perceiving  its 
artificiality.     It  is,  in  fact,  a  type  of  the  history  of 
the  human  race,  not  on  the  higher  plane,  but  on 
the   physical  one ;    the   history  of  man's   contest 
with  and  final  victory  over  physical  nature.     The 
very   simplicity  and   obviousness   of  the    details 
give  them  grandeur  and  comprehensiveness:   no 
part   of  man's   character  which  his  contact  with 
nature    can  affect   or   develop   is   left  untried  in 
Robinson.     He  manifests   in   little    all   historical 
earthly    experiences    of    the    race ;     such   is  the 
scheme  of  the  book ;  and  its  permanence  in  litera 
ture   is   due  to   the  sobriety   and   veracity   with 
which  that  scheme  is  carried  out.     To  speak  suc 
cinctly,  it  does  for  the  body   what  the   hermetic 
and  cognate  literature  does  for  the  soul ;  and  for 
the  healthy  man,  the  body  is  not  less  important 


124  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

than  the  soul  in  its  own  place  and  degree.  It  is 
not  the  work  of  the  Creator,  but  it  is  contingent 
upon  creation. 

But  poor  Robinson  has  been  most  unfortunate 
in   his  progeny,  which  at   this  day  overrun   the 
whole  earth,  and   render   it   a  worse  wilderness 
than  ever  was  the  immortal  Crusoe  Island.     Miss 
Edgeworth,  indeed,  might  fairly  pose  as  the  most 
persistently  malignant  of  all  sources  of  error  in 
the  design  of  children's  literature  ;  but  it  is  to  be 
feared  that  it  was  Defoe  who  first  made  her  aware 
of  the  availability  of  her  own  venom.     She  foisted 
her  prim  and  narrow  moral  code  upon  the  com 
monplace  adventures  of  a  priggish  little  boy  and 
his  companions ;  and  straightway  the  whole  dreary 
and  disastrous  army  of  sectarians  and  dogmatists 
took  up  the  cry,  and  have  been  ringing  the  lugu 
brious  changes  on  it  ever  since.     There  is  really 
no  estimating  the  mortal  wrong  that  has   been 
done  to  childhood  by  Maria  Edgeworth's  "Frank  " 
and  "  The  Parent's  Assistant ";  arid,  for  my  part, 
I  derive  a  melancholy  joy  in  availing  myself  of 
this  opportunity  to  express  my  sense  of  my  per 
sonal   share    in   the   injury.     I   believe    that   my 
affection     for    the    human    race    is    as    genuine 
as  the  average;    but   I   am   sure  it  would  have 


LITERATURE  FOB   CHILDREN.  125 

been  greater  had  Miss  Edgeworth  never  been 
born;  and  were  I  to  come  across  any  philo 
sophical  system  whereby  I  could  persuade  my 
self  that  she  belonged  to  some  other  order 
of  beings  than  the  human,  I  should  be  strongly 
tempted  to  embrace  that  system  on  that  ground 
alone. 

After  what  has  been  advanced  in  the  preceding 
pages,  it  does  not  need  that  I  should  state  how 
earnestly  I  deprecate  the  kind  of  literary  food 
which  we  are  now  furnishing  to  the  coming  gen 
eration  in  such  sinister  abundance.  I  am  sure  it 
is  written  and  published  with  good  and  honorable 
motives ;  but  at  the  very  best  it  can  only  do  no 
harm.  Moreover,  however  well  intentioned,  it  is 
bad  as  literature ;  it  is  poorly  conceived  and  writ 
ten,  and,  what  is  worse,  it  is  saturated  with  affec 
tation.  For  an  impression  prevails  that  one  needs 
to  talk  down  to  children ;  —  to  keep  them  con 
stantly  reminded  that  they  are  innocent,  ignorant 
little  things,  whose  consuming  wish  it  is  to  be 
good  and  go  to  Sunday-school,  and  who  will  be 
all  gratitude  and  docility  to  whomsoever  provides 
them  with  the  latest  fashion  of  moral  sugar 
plums  ;  whereas,  so  far  as  my  experience  and  in 
formation  goes,  children  are  the  most  formidable 


126  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

literary  critics  in  the  world.  Matthew  Arnold 
himself  has  not  so  sure  an  instinct  for  what  is 
sound  and  good  in  a  book  as  any  intelligent  little 
boy  or  girl  of  eight  years  old.  They  judge  abso 
lutely;  they  are  hampered  by  no  comparisons  or 
relative  considerations.  They  cannot  give  chapter 
and  verse  for  their  opinion ;  but  about  the  opinion 
itself  there  is  no  doubt.  They  have  no  theories ; 
they  judge  in  a  white  light.  They  have  no  prej 
udices  nor  traditions ;  they  come  straight  from 
the  simple  source  of  life.  But,  on  the  other  hand, 
they  are  readily  hocussed  and  made  morbid  by 
improper  drugs,  and  presently,  no  doubt,  lose 
their  appetite  for  what  is  wholesome.  Now,  we 
cannot  hope  that  an  army  of  hermetic  philos 
ophers  or  Mother-Gooses  will  arise  at  need 
and  remedy  all  abuses;  but  at  least  we  might 
refrain  from  moralizing  and  instruction,  and, 
if  we  can  do  nothing  more,  confine  ourselves 
to  plain  stories  of  adventure,  say,  with  no  ulte 
rior  object  whatever.  There  still  remains  the 
genuine  literature  of  the  past  to  draw  upon; 
but  let  us  beware,  as  we  would  of  forgery  and 
perjury,  of  serving  it  up,  as  has  been  done  too 
often,  medicated  and  modified  to  suit  the  foolish 
dogmatism  of  the  moment.  Hans  Christian 


LITERATURE  FOR  CHILDREN.       127 

Andersen  was  the  last  writer  of  children's 
stories,  properly  so  called;  though,  considering 
how  well  married  to  his  muse  he  was,  it  is  a 
wonder  as  well  as  a  calamity  that  he  left  no 
descendants. 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE  MORAL  AIM  IN  FICTION. 

THE  producers  of  modern  fiction,  who  have  ac 
quiesced  more  or  less  completely  in  the  theory  of 
art  for  art's  sake,  are  not,  perhaps,  aware  that  a 
large  class  of  persons  still  exist  who  hold  fiction 
to  be  unjustifiable,  save  in  so  far  as  the  author  has 
it  at  heart  not  only  (or  chiefly)  to  adorn  the  tale, 
but  also  (and  first  of  all)  to  point  the  moral.  The 
novelist,  in  other  words,  should  so  mould  the 
characters  and  shape  the  plot  of  his  imaginary 
drama  as  to  vindicate  the  wisdom  and  integrity  of 
the  Decalogue :  if  he  fail  to  do  this,  or  if  he  do 
the  opposite  of  this,  he  deserves  not  the  counte 
nance  of  virtuous  and  God-fearing  persons. 

Doubtless  it  should  be  evident  to  every  sane  and 
impartial  mind,  whether  orthodox  or  agnostic,  that 
an  art  which  runs  counter  to  the  designs  of  God 
toward  the  human  race,  or  to  the  growth  of  the 
sentiment  of  universal  human  brotherhood,  must 
sooner  or  later  topple  down  from  its  fantastic  and 

128 


THE   MORAL  AIM   IN  FICTION.  129 

hollow  foundation.  "  Hitch  your  wagon  to  a  star," 
says  Emerson;  "do  not  lie  and  steal:  no  god  will 
help."  And  although,  for  the  sake  of  his  own 
private  interests  of  the  moment,  a  man  will  oc 
casionally  violate  the  moral  law,  yet,  with  man 
kind  at  large,  the  necessity  of  vindicating  the 
superior  advantages  of  right  over  wrong  is  ac 
knowledged  not  only  in  the  interests  of  civilized 
society,  but  because  we  feel  that,  however  hostile 
"  goodness  "  may  seem  to  be  to  my  or  your  per 
sonal  and  temporary  aims,  it  still  remains  the  only 
wholesome  and  handsome  choice  for  the  race  at 
large :  and  therefore  do  we,  as  a  race,  refuse  to 
tolerate  —  on  no  matter  how  plausible  an  artistic 
plea  —  any  view  of  human  life  which  either  pro 
fesses  indifference  to  this  universal  sentiment,  or 
perversely  challenges  it. 

The  true  ground  of  dispute,  then,  does  not  lie 
here.  The  art  which  can  stoop  to  be  "  procuress 
to  the  lords  of  hell,"  is  art  no  longer.  But,  on  the 
other  hand,  it  would  be  difficult  to  point  to  any 
great  work  of  art,  generally  acknowledged  to  be 
such,  which  explicitly  concerns  itself  with  the  vin 
dication  of  any  specific  moral  doctrine.  The  story 
in  which  the  virtuous  are  rewarded  for  their  vir 
tue,  and  the  evil  punished  for  their  wickedness, 


130  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

fails,  somehow,  to  enlist  our  full  sympathy;  it 
falls  flatly  on  the  ear  of  the  mind ;  it  does  not 
stimulate  thought.  It  does  not  satisfy ;  we  fancy 
that  something  still  remains  to  be  said,  or,  if  this 
be  all,  then  it  was  hardly  worth  saying.  The  real 
record  of  life  —  its  terror,  its  beauty,  its  pathos, 
its  depth  —  seems  to  have  been  missed.  We  may 
admit  that  the  tale  is  in  harmony  with  what  we 
have  been  taught  ought  to  happen;  but  the  les 
sons  of  our  private  experience  have  not  authenti 
cated  our  moral  formulas ;  we  have  seen  the  evil 
<exalted  and  the  good  brought  low;  and  we  inevi 
tably  desire  that  our  "  fiction  "  shall  tell  us,  not 
what  ought  to  happen,  but  what,  as  a  matter  of 
fact,  does  happen.  To  put  this  a  little  differently: 
we  feel  that  the  God  of  the  orthodox  moralist  is 
not  the  God  of  human  nature.  He  is  nothing  but 
the  moralist  himself  in  a  highly  sublimated  state, 
but  betraying,  in  spite  of  that  sublimation,  a  fatal 
savor  of  human  personality.  The  conviction  that 
any  man  —  George  Washington,  let  us  say  —  is  a 
morally  unexceptionable  man,  does  not  in  the 
least  reconcile  us  to  the  idea  of  God  being  an  in 
definitely  exalted  counterpart  of  Washington. 
Such  a  God  would  be  "  most  tolerable,  and  not  to 
be  endured";  and  the  more  exalted  he  was,  the 


THE  MORAL  AIM  IN  FICTION.  131 

less  endurable  would  he  be.  In  short,  man  in 
stinctively  refuses  to  regard  the  literal  inculcation 
of  the  Decalogue  as  the  final  word  of  God  to  the 
human  race,  and  much  less  to  the  individuals  of 
that  race;  and  when  he  finds  a  story-teller  proceed 
ing  upon  the  contrary  assumption,  he  is  apt  to  put 
that  story-teller  down  as  either  an  ass  or  a  hum 
bug.  As  for  art  —  if  the  reader  happen  to  be 
competent  to  form  an  opinion  on  that  phase  of 
the  matter  —  he  will  generally  find  that  the  art 
dwindles  in  direct  proportion  as  the  moralized 
deity  expatiates;  in  fact,  that  they  are  incom 
patible.  And  he  will  also  confess  (if  he  have  the 
courage  of  his  opinions)  that,  as  between  moral 
ized  deity  and  true  art,  his  choice  is  heartily  and 
unreservedly  for  the  latter. 

I  do  not  apprehend  that  the  above  remarks, 
fairly  interpreted,  will  encounter  serious  opposi 
tion  from  either  party  to  the  discussion ;  and  yet,  so 
far  as  I  am  aware,  neither  party  has  as  yet  availed 
himself  of  the  light  which  the  conclusion  throws 
upon  the  nature  of  art  itself.  It  should  be  ob 
vious,  however,  that  upon  a  true  definition  of  art 
the  whole  argument  must  ultimately  hinge  :  for 
we  can  neither  deny  that  art  exists,  nor  affirm 
that  it  can  exist  inconsistently  with  a  recognition 


132  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

of  a  divinely  beneficent  purpose  in  creation.  It 
must,  therefore,  in  some  way  be  an  expression  or 
reflection  of  that  purpose.  But  in  what  does  the 
purpose  in  question  essentially  consist  ? 

Broadly  speaking  —  for  it  would  be  impossible 
within  the  present  limits  to  attempt  a  full  analysis 
of  the  subject  —  it  may  be  considered  as  a  gradual 
and  progressive  Purification,  not  of  this  or  that 
particular  individual  in  contradistinction  to  his 
fellows,  but  of  human  nature  as  an  entirety.  The 
evil  into  which  all  men  are  born,  and  of  which  the 
Decalogue,  or  conscience,  makes  us  aware,  is  not 
an  evil  voluntarily  contracted  on  our  part,  but  is 
inevitable  to  us  as  the  creation  of  a  truly 
infinite  love  and  wisdom.  It  is,  in  fact,  our 
characteristic  nature  as  animals :  and  it  is  only 
because  we  are  not  only  animal,  but  also  and 
above  all  human,  that  we  are  enabled  to  recog 
nize  it  as  evil  instead  of  good.  We  absolve 
the  cat,  the  dog,  the  wolf,  and  the  lion  from 
any  moral  responsibility  for  their  deeds,  because 
we  feel  them  to  be  deficient  in  conscience,  which 
is  our  own  divinely  bestowed  gift  and  privilege, 
and  which  has  been  defined  as  the  spirit  of 
God  in  the  created  nature,  seeking  to  become  the 
creature's  own  spirit.  Now,  the  power  to  correct 


THE  MORAL  AIM   IN  FICTION.  133 

this  evil  does  not  abide  in  us  as  individuals,  nor 
will  a  literal  adherence  to  the  moral  law  avail 
to  purify  any  mother's  son  of  us.  Conscience 
always  says  "  Do  not,"  —  never  "  Do  "  ;  and 
obedience  to  it  neither  can  give  us  a  personal 
claim  on  God's  favor  nor  was  it  intended  to  do 
so :  its  true  function  is  to  keep  us  innocent,  so 
that  we  may  not  individually  obstruct  the  accom 
plishment  of  the  divine  ends  toward  us  as  a  race. 
Our  nature  not  being  the  private  possession  of  any 
one  of  us,  but  the  impersonal  substratum  of  us  all, 
it  follows  that  it  cannot  be  redeemed  piecemeal,  but 
only  as  a  whole ;  and,  manifestly,  the  only  Being 
capable  of  effecting  such  redemption  is  not  Peter^ 
or  Paul,  or  George  Washington,  or  any  other  atom 
ic  exponent  of  that  nature,  be  he  who  he  may; 
but  He  alone  whose  infinitude  is  the  complement 
of  our  finiteness,  and  whose  gradual  descent  into 
human  nature  (figured  in  Scripture  under  the 
symbol  of  the  Incarnation)  is  even  now  being  ac 
complished —  as  any  one  may  perceive  who  reads 
aright  the  progressive  enlightenment  of  con 
science  and  intellect  which  history,  through  many 
vicissitudes,  displays.  We  find,  therefore,  that  art 
is,  essentially,  the  imaginative  expression  of  a 
divine  life  in  man.  Art  depends  for  its  worth 


134  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

and  veracity,  not  upon  its  adherence  to  literal 
fact,  but  upon  its  perception  and  portrayal  of  the 
underlying  truth,  of  which  fact  is  but  the  phenom 
enal  and  imperfect  shadow.  And  it  can  have 
nothing  to  do  with  personal  vice  or  virtue,  in  the 
way  either  of  condemning  the  one  or  vindicating 
the  other ;  it  can  only  treat  them  as  elements  in 
its  picture  —  as  factors  in  human  destiny.  For 
the  notion  commonly  entertained  that  the 
practice  of  virtue  gives  us  a  claim  upon  the 
Divine  Exchequer  (so  to  speak),  and  the  habit  of 
acting  virtuously  for  the  sake  of  maintaining  our 
credit  in  society,  and  ensuring  our  prosperity  in 
the  next  world, —  in  so  thinking  and  acting  we 
misapprehend  the  true  inwardness  of  the  matter. 
To  cultivate  virtue  because  its  pays,  no  matter 
what  the  sort  of  coin  in  which  payment  is  looked 
for,  is  to  be  the  victims  of  a  lamentable  delusion. 
For  such  virtue  makes  each  man  jealous  of  his 
neighbor ;  whereas  the  aim  of  Providence-  is  to 
bring  about  the  broadest  human  fellowship.  A 
man's  physical  body  separates  him  from  other 
men ;  and  this  fact  disposes  him  to  the  error  that 
his  nature  is  also  a  separate  possession,  and  that 
he  can  only  be  "good"  by  denying  himself.  But 
the  only  goodness  that  is  really  good  is  a  spon- 


THE   MORAL   AIM  IN   FICTION.  135 

taneous  and  impersonal  evolution,  and  this  occurs, 
not  where  self-denial  has  been  practised,  but 
only  where  a  man  feels  himself  to  be  absolutely 
on  the  same  level  of  desert  or  non-desert  as  are 
the  mass  of  his  fellow-creatures.  There  is  no  use 
in  obeying  the  commandments,  unless  it  be  done, 
not  to  make  one's  self  more  deserving  than 
another  of  God's  approbation,  but  out  of  love  for 
goodness  and  truth  in  themselves,  apart  from  any 
personal  considerations.  The  difference  between 
true  religion  and  formal  religion  is  that  the  first 
leads  us  to  abandon  all  personal  claims  to  sal 
vation,  and  to  care  only  for  the  salvation  of 
humanity  as  a  whole  ;  whereas  the  latter  stim 
ulates  us  to  practise  outward  self-denial,  in  order 
that  our  real  self  may  be  exalted.  Such  self- 
denial  results  not  in  humility,  but  in  spiritual 
pride, 

In  no  other  way  than  this,  it  seeins  to  me,  can 
art  and  morality  be  brought  into  harmony. 
Art  bears  witness  to  the  presence  in  us  of  some 
thing  purer  and  loftier  than  anything  of  which  we 
can  be  individually  conscious.  Its  complete  ex 
pression  we  call  inspiration ;  and  he  who  is  the 
subject  of  the  inspiration  can  account  no  better 
than  any  one  else  for  the  result  which  art  accom- 


136  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

plishes  through  him.  The  perfect  poem  is  found, 
not  made  ;  the  mind  which  utters  it  did  not  in 
vent  it.  Art  takes  all  nature  and  all  knowledge 
for  her  province ;  but  she  does  not  leave  it  as  she 
found  it ;  by  the  divine  necessity  that  is  upon  her, 
she  breathes  a  soul  into  her  materials,  and  organ 
izes  chaos  into  form.  But  never,  under  any  cir 
cumstances,  does  she  deign  to  minister  to  our 
selfish  personal  hope  or  greed.  She  shows  us  how 
to  love  our  neighbor,  never  ourselves.  Shak- 
speare,  Homer,  Phidias,  Raphael,  were  no  Phar 
isees  —  at  least  in  so  far  as  they  were  artists ;  nor 
did  any  one  ever  find  in  their  works  any  coun 
tenance  for  that  inhuman  assumption  —  "I  am  ho 
lier  than  thou  ! "  In  the  world's  darkest  hours, 
art  has  sometimes  stood  as  the  sole  witness  of  the 
nobler  life  that  was  in  eclipse.  Civilizations  arise 
and  vanish ;  forms  of  religion  hold  sway  and  are 
forgotten;  learning  and  science  advance  and  gather 
strength ;  but  true  art  was  as  great  and  as  beau 
tiful  three  thousand  years  ago  as  it  is  to-day.  We 
are  prone  to  confound  the  man  with  the  artist, 
and  to  suppose  that  he  is  artistic  by  possession 
and  inheritance,  instead  of  exclusively  by  dint 
of  what  he  does.  No  artist  worthy  the  name  ever 
dreams  of  putting  himself  into  his  work,  but 


THE  MORAL  AIM  IN   FICTION.  137 

only  what  is  infinitely  distinct  from  and  other 
than  himself.  It  is  not  the  poet  who  brings  forth 
the  poem,  but  the  poem  that  begets  the  poet ;  it 
makes  him,  educates  him,  creates  in  him  the 
poetic  faculty.  Those  whom  we  call  great  men, 
the  heroes  of  history,  are  but  the  organs  of  great 
crises  and  opportunities:  as  Emerson  has  said, 
they  are  the  most  indebted  men.  In  themselves 
they  are  not  great ;  there  is  no  ratio  between  their 
achievements  and  them.  Our  judgment  is  mis 
led;  we  do  not  discriminate  between  the  divine 
purpose  and  the  human  instrument.  When  we 
listen  to  Napoleon  fretting  his  soul  away  at  Elba, 
or  to  Carlyle  wrangling  with  his  wife  at  Chelsea, 
we  are  shocked  at  the  discrepancy  between  the 
lofty  public  performance  and  the  petty  domestic 
shortcoming.  Yet  we  do  wrong  to  blame  them ; 
the  nature  of  which  they  are  examples  is  the  same 
nature  that  is  shared  also  by  the  publican  and 
the  sinner. 

Instead,  therefore,  of  saying  that  art  should  be 
moral,  we  should  rather  say  that  all  true  morality 
is  art  —  that  art  is  the  test  of  morality.  To  at 
tempt  to  make  this  heavenly  Pegasus  draw  the 
sordid  plough  of  our  selfish  moralistic  prejudices 
is  a  grotesque  subversion  of  true  order.  Why 


138  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

should  the  novelist  make  believe  that  the  wicked 
are  punished  and  the  good  are  rewarded  in  this 
world?  Does  he  not  know,  on  the  contrary,  that 
whatsoever  is  basest  in  our  common  life  tends 
irresistibly  to  'the  highest  places,  and  that  the 
selfish  element  in  our  nature  is  on  the  side  of 
public  order  ?  Evil  is  at  present  a  more  efficient 
instrument  of  order  (because  an  interested  one) 
than  good ;  and  the  novelist  who  makes  this  appear 
will  do  a  far  greater  and  more  lasting  benefit 
to  humanity  than  he  who  follows  the  cut-arid- 
dried  artificial  programme  of  bestowing  crowns 
on  the  saint  and  whips  of  scorpions  on  the 
sinner. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  repeat,  the  best  influences 
of  the  best  literature  have  never  been  didactic, 
and  there  is  no  reason  to  believe  they  ever  will 
be.  The  only  semblance  of  didacticism  which 
can  enter  into  literature  is  that  which  conveys 
such  lessons  as  may  be  learned  from  sea  and  sky, 
mountain  and  valley,  wood  and  stream,  bird  and 
beast;  and  from  the  broad  human  life  of  races, 
nations,  and  firesides ;  a  lesson  that  is  not  obvious 
and  superficial,  but  so  profoundly  hidden  in  the 
creative  depths  as  to  emerge  only  to  an  appre 
hension  equally  profound.  For  the  chatter  and 


THE  MOKAL  AIM  IN  FICTION.  139 

affectation  of  sense  disturb  and  offend  that  inward 
spiritual  ear  which,  in  the  silent  recesses  of 
meditation,  hears  the  prophetic  murmur  of  the 
vast  ocean  of  human  nature  that  flows  within  us 
and  around  us  all. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

THE  MAKER  OF  MANY  BOOKS. 

DURING  the  winter  of  1879,  when  I  was  in 
London,  it  was  iny  fortune  to  attend  a  social 
meeting  of  literary  men  at  the  rooms  of  a  certain 
eminent  publisher.  The  rooms  were  full  of  to 
bacco-smoke  and  talk,  amid  which  were  discerni 
ble,  on  all  sides,  the  figures  and  faces  of  men  more 
or  less  renowned  in  the  world  of  books.  Most 
noticeable  among  these  personages  was  a  broad- 
shouldered,  sturdy  man,  of  middle  height,  with  a 
ruddy  countenance,  and  snow-white  tempestuous 
beard  and  hair.  He  wore  large,  gold-rimmed 
spectacles,  but  his  eyes  were  black  and  brilliant, 
and  looked  at  his  interlocutor  with  a  certain 
genial  fury  of  inspection.  He  seemed  to  be  in 
a  state  of  some  excitement ;  he  spoke  volubly 
and  almost  boisterously,  and  his  voice  was  full- 
toned  and  powerful,  though  pleasant  to  the  ear. 
He  turned  himself,  as  he  spoke,  with  a  burly 
briskness,  from  one  side  to  another,  addressing 

140 


THE  MAKER  OF  MANY  BOOKS.       141 

himself  first  to  this  auditor  and  then  to  that,  his 
words  bursting  forth  from  beneath  his  white 
moustache  with  such  an  impetus  of  hearty  breath 
that  it  seemed  as  if  all  opposing  arguments  must 
be  blown  quite  away.  Meanwhile  he  flourished  in 
the  air  an  ebony  walking-stick,  with  much  vigor 
of  gesticulation,  and  narrowly  missing,  as  it  ap 
peared,  the  pates  of  his  listeners.  He  was  clad  in 
evening  dress,  though  the  rest  of  the  company 
was,  for  the  most  part,  in  mufti ;  and  he  was  an 
exceedingly  fine-looking  old  gentleman.  At  the 
first  glance,  you  would  have  taken  him  to  be  some 
civilized  and  modernized  Squire  Western,  nour 
ished  with  beef  and  ale,  and  roughly  hewn  out  of 
the  most  robust  and  least  refined  variety  of  human 
clay.  Looking  at  him  more  narrowly,  however, 
you  would  have  reconsidered  this  judgment. 
Though  his  general  contour  and  aspect  were 
massive  and  sturdy,  the  lines  of  his  features  were 
delicately  cut ;  his  complexion  was  remarkably 
pure  and  fine,  and  his  face  was  susceptible  of  very 
subtle  and  sensitive  changes  of  expression.  Here 
was  a  man  of  abundant  physical  strength  and 
vigor,  no  doubt,  but  carrying  within  him  a  nature 
more  than  commonly  alert  and  impressible.  His 
organization,  though  thoroughly  healthy,  was  both 


142  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

complex  and  high-wrought ;  his  character  was  sim 
ple  and  straightforward  to  a  fault,  but  he  was  ab 
normally  conscientious,  and  keenly  alive  to  others' 
opinion  concerning  him.  It  might  be  thought 
that  he  was  overburdened  with  self-esteem,  and 
unduly  opinionated ;  but,  in  fact,  lie  was  but  over 
anxious  to  secure  the  good-will  and  agreement  of 
all  with  whom  he  came  in  contact.  There  was 
some  peculiarity  in  him  —  some  element  or  bias 
in  his  composition  that  made  him  different  from 
other  men ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  there  was  an 
ardent  solicitude  to  annul  or  reconcile  this  differ 
ence,  and  to  prove  himself  to  be,  in  fact,  of  abso 
lutely  the  same  cut  and  quality  as  all  the  rest  of 
the  world.  Hence  he  was  in  a  demonstrative,  ex 
pository,  or  argumentative  mood ;  he  could  not  sit 
quiet  in  the  face  of  a  divergence  between  himself 
and  his  associates ;  he  was  incorrigibly  strenuous 
to  obliterate  or  harmonize  the  irreconcilable  points 
between  him  and  others;  and  since  these  points 
remained  irreconcilable,  he  remained  in  a  constant 
state  of  storm  and  stress  on  the  subject. 

It  was  impossible  to  help  liking  such  a  man  at 
first  sight ;  and  I  believe  that  no  man  in  London 
society  was  more  generally  liked  than  Anthony 
Trollope.  There  was  something  pathetic  in  his 


THE  MAKER   OF  MANY  BOOKS.  143 

attitude  as  above  indicated;  and  a  fresh  and  boy 
ish  quality  always  invested  him.  His  artlessness 
was  boyish,  and  so  were  his  acuteness  and  his 
transparent  but  somewhat  belated  good-sense. 
Pie  was  one  of  those  rare  persons  who  not  only 
have  no  reserves,  but  who  can  afford  to  dispense 
with  them.  After  he  had  shown  you  all  he  had  in 
him,  you  would  have  seen  nothing  that  was  not 
gentlemanly,  honest,  and  clean.  He  was  a  quick 
tempered  man,  and  the  ardor  and  hurry  of  his  tem 
perament  made  him  seem  more  so  than  he  really 
was;  but  he  was  never  more  angry  than  he  was 
forgiving  and  generous.  He  was  hurt  by  little 
things,  and  little  things  pleased  him ;  he  was  sus 
picious  and  perverse,  but  in  a  manner  that  rather 
endeared  him  to  you  than  otherwise.  Altogether, 
to  a  casual  acquaintance,  who  knew  nothing  of 
his  personal  history,  he  was  something  of  a  para 
dox —  an  entertaining  contradiction.  The  publi 
cation  of  his  autobiography  explained  many  things 
in  his  character  that  were  open  to  speculation; 
and,  indeed,  the  book  is  not  only  the  most  inter 
esting  and  amusing  that  its  author  has  ever  writ 
ten,  but  it  places  its  subject  before  the  reader 
more  completely  and  comprehensively  than  most 
autobiographies  do.  This,  however,  is  due  much 


144  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

less  to  any  direct  effort  or  intention  on  the  writer's 
part,  than  to  the  unconscious  self-revelation  which 
meets  the  reader  on  every  page.  No  narrative 
could  be  simpler,  less  artificial ;  and  yet,  every 
where,  we  read  between  the  lines,  and,  so  to 
speak,  discover  Anthony  Trollops  in  spite  of  his 
efforts  to  discover  himself  to  us. 

The  truth  appears  to  be  that  the  youthful  Trol- 
lope,  like  a  more  famous  fellow-novelist,  began 
the  world  with  more  kicks  than  half-pence.  His 
boyhood,  he  affirms,  was  as  unhappy  as  that  of  a 
young  gentleman  could  well  be,  owing  to  a  mix 
ture  of  poverty  and  gentle  standing  on  his  father's 
part,  and,  on  his  own,  to  "  an  utter  lack  of  juve 
nile  manhood  "  —  whatever  that  may  be.  His 
father  was  a  lawyer,  who  frightened  away  all  his 
clients  by  his  outrageous  temper,  and  who  encoun 
tered  one  mischance  after  another  until  he  landed 
himself  and  his  family  in  open  bankruptcy ;  from 
which  they  were  rescued,  partly  by  death,  which 
carried  away  four  of  them  (including  the  old  gen 
tleman),  and  partly  by  Mrs.  Trollope,  who,  at  fifty 
years  of  age,  brought  out  her  famous  book  on 
America,  and  continued  to  make  a  fair  income  by 
literature  (as  she  called  it)  until  1856,  when, 
being  seventy-six  years  old,  and  having  produced 


THE  MAKER  OF  MANY  BOOKS.       145 

one  hundred  and  fourteen  volumes,  she  permitted 
herself  to  retire.  This  extraordinary  lady,  iu  her 
youth,  cherished  what  her  son  calls  "an  emotional 
dislike  to  tyrants " ;  but  when  her  American  ex 
perience  had  made  her  acquainted  with  some  of 
the  seamy  aspects  of  democracy,  and  especially 
after  the  aristocracy  of  her  own  country  had  be 
gun  to  patronize  her,  she  confessed  the  error  of  her 
early  way,  "and  thought  that  archduchesses  were 
sweet."  But  she  was  certainly  a  valiant  and  inde 
fatigable  woman,  —  "  of  all  the  people  I  have  ever 
known,"  says  her  son,  "the  most  joyous,  or,  at  any 
rate,  the  most  capable  of  joy  " ;  and  he  adds  that 
her  best  novels  were  written  in  1834-35,  when 
her  husband  and  four  of  her  six  children  were 
dying  upstairs  of  consumption,  and  she  had  to  di 
vide  her  time  between  nursing  them  and  writing. 
Assuredly,  no  son  of  hers  need  apprehend  the 
reproach  —  "Tydides  melior  matre" ;  though  An 
thony,  and  his  brother  Thomas  Adolphus,  must, 
together,  have  run  her  pretty  hard.  The  former 
remarks,  with  that  terrible  complacency  in  an  aw- 
^ful  fact  which  is  one  of  his  most  noticeable  and 
astounding  traits,  that  the  three  of  them  "  wrote 
more  books  than  were  probably  ever  before  pro 
duced  by  a  single  family."  The  existence  -of  a 


146  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

few  more  such  families  could  be  consistent  only 
with  a  generous  enlargement  of  the  British  Mu 
seum. 

The  elder  Trollope  was  a  scholar,  and  to  make 
scholars  of  his  sons  was  one  of  his  ruling  ideas. 
Poor  little  Anthony  endured  no  less  than  twelve 
mortal  years  of  schooling  —  from  the  time  he  was 
seven  until  he  was  nineteen  —  and  declares  that, 
in  all  that  time,  he  does  not  remember  that  he 
ever  knew  a  lesson.  "  I  have  been  flogged,"  he 
says,  "oftener  than  any  other  human  being." 
Nay,  his  troubles  began  before  his  school-days; 
for  his  father  used  to  make  him  recite  his  infantile 
tasks  to  him  while  he  was  shaving,  and  obliged 
him  to  sit  with  his  head  inclined  in  such  a  manner 
"  that  he  could  pull  my  hair  without  stopping  his 
razor  or  dropping  his  shaving-brush."  This  is  a 
depressing  picture ;  and  there  are  plenty  more  like 
it.  Dr.  Butler,  the  master  of  Harrow,  meeting 
the  poor  little  draggletail  urchin  in  the  yard,  de 
sired  to  know,  in  awful  accents,  how  so  dirty  a 
boy  dared  to  show  himself  near  the  school !  "He 
must  have  known  me,  had  he  seen  me  as  he  was 
wont  to  see  me,  for  he  was  in  the  habit  of  flogging 
me  constantly.  Perhaps,"  adds  his  victim,  "  he 
did  not  recognize  me  by  my  face !  "  But  it  is 


THE  MAKER  OF  MANY  BOOKS.       147 

comforting  to  leain,  in  another  place,  that  justice 
overtook  the  oppressor.  "  Dr.  Butler  only  lived 
to  be  Dean  of  Peterborough ;  but  his  successor 
(Dr.  Longley)  became  Archbishop  of  Canter 
bury."  There  is  a  great  deal  of  Trollopian  moral 
ity  in  the  fate  of  these  two  men,  the  latter  of 
whom  "  could  not  have  said  anything  ill-natured 
if  he  had  tried." 

Black  care,  however,  continued  to  sit  behind 
the  horseman  with  harrowing  persistence.  A  cer 
tain  Dr.  Drury  (another  schoolmaster)  punished 
him  on  suspicion  of  "some  nameless  horror,"  of 
which  the  unfortunate  youngster  happened  to  be 
innocent.  When,  afterward,  the  latter  fact  began 
to  be  obvious,  "  he  whispered  to  me  half  a  word 
that  perhaps  he  had  been  wrong.  But,  with  a 
boy's  stupid  slowness,  I  said  nothing,  and  he  had 
not  the  courage  to  carry  reparation  farther."' 
The  poverty  of  Anthony's  father  deprived  the 
boy  of  all  the  external  advantages  that  might 
have  enabled  him  to  take  rank  with  his  fellows : 
and  his  native  awkwardness  and  sensitiveness 
widened  the  breach.  "  I  had  no  friend  to  whom 
I  could  pour  out  my  sorrows.  I  was  big,  awk 
ward  and  ugly,  and,  I  have  no  doubt,  skulked 
about  in  a  most  unattractive  manner.  Something 


148  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

of  the  disgrace  of  my  school-days  has  clung  to  me 
all  through  life.  When  I  have  been  claimed  as 
school-fellow  by  some  of  those  many  hundreds 
who  were  with  me  either  at  Harrow  or  at  Win 
chester,  I  have  felt  that  I  had  no  right  to  talk  of 
things  from  most  of  which  I  was  kept  in  estrange 
ment.  I  was  never  a  coward,  but  to  make  a 
stand  against  three  hundred  tyrants  required  a 
moral  courage  which  I  did  not  possess."  Once, 
however,  they  pushed  him  too  far,  and  he  was 
driven  to  rebellion.  "  And  then  came  a  great 
fight  —  at  the  end  of  which  my  opponent  had  to 
be  taken  home  to  be  cured."  And  then  he  utters 
the  characteristic  wish  that  some  one,  of  the  many 
who  witnessed  this  combat,  may  still  be  left  alive 
"  who  will  be  able  to  say  that,  in  claiming  this 
solitary  glory  of  my  school-days,  I  am  making 
no  false  boast."  The  lonely,  lugubrious  little 
champion  !  One  would  almost  have  been  willing 
to  have  received  from  him  a  black  eye  and  a 
bloody  nose,  only  to  comfort  his  sad  heart.  It  is 
delightful  to  imagine  the  terrific  earnestness  of 
that  solitary  victory :  and  I  would  like  to  know 
what  boy  it  was  (if  any)  who  lent  the  unpopular 
warrior  a  knee  and  wiped  his  face. 

After  he  got  through  his  school-days,  his  family 


THE  MAKER   OF  MANY  BOOKS.  149 

being  then  abroad,  he  had  an  offer  of  a  commis 
sion  iii  an  Austrian  cavalry  regiment;  and  he 
might  have  been  a  major-general  or  field-marshal 
at  this  day  had  his  schooling  made  him  acquaint 
ed  with  the  French  and  German  languages.  Be 
ing,  however,  entirely  ignorant  of  these,  he  was 
obliged  to  study  them  in  order  to  his  admission ; 
and  while  he  was  thus  employed,  he  received 
news  of  a  vacant  clerkship  in  the  General  Post- 
Office,  with  the  dazzling  salary  of  .£90  a  year. 
Needless  to  say  that  he  jumped  at  such  an  open 
ing,  seeing  before  him  a  vision  of  a  splendid  civil 
and  social  career,  at  something  over  twenty 
pounds  a  quarter.  But  London,  even  fifty  years 
ago,  was  a  more  expensive  place  than  Anthony 
imagined.  Moreover,  the  boy  was  alone  in  the 
wilderness  of  the  city,  with  no  one  to  advise  or 
guide  him.  The  consequence  was  that  these  lat 
ter  days  of  his  youth  were  as  bad  or  worse  than 
the  beginning.  In  reviewing  his  plight  at  this 
period,  he  observes  :  "  I  had  passed  my  life  where 
I  had  seen  gay  things,  but  had  never  enjoyed 
them.  There  was  no  house  in  which  I  could  ha 
bitually  see  a  lady's  face  or  hear  a  lady's  voice. 
At  the  Post-Office  I  got  credit  for  nothing,  and 
was  reckless.  I  hated  my  work,  and,  more  than 


150  CONFESSIONS   AND   CKITICISMS. 

all,  I  hated  my  idleness.  Borrowings  of  money, 
sometimes  absolute  want,  and  almost  constant 
misery,  followed  as  a  matter  of  course.  I  had  a 
full  conviction  that  my  life  was  taking  me  down 
to  the  lowest  pits  —  a  feeling  that  I  had  been 
looked  upon  as  an  evil,  an  encumbrance,  a  useless 
thing,  a  creature  of  whom  those  connected  with 
me  had  to  be  ashamed.  Even  my  few  friends 
were  half-ashamed  of  me.  I  acknowledge  the 
weakness  of  a  great  desire  to  be  loved  —  a  strong 
wish  to  be  popular.  No  one  had  ever  been  less 
so."  Under  these  circumstances,  he  remarks 
that,  although,  no  doubt,  if  the  mind  be  strong 
enough,  the  temptation  will  not  prevail,  yet  he 
is  fain  to  admit  that  the  temptation  prevailed 
with  him.  He  did  not  sit  at  home,  after  his  re 
turn  from  the  office,  in  the  evening,  to  drink  tea 
and  read,  but  tramped  out  in  the  streets,  and 
tried  to  see  life  and  be  jolly  on  £90  a  year.  He 
borrowed  four  pounds  of  a  money-lender,  to  aug 
ment  his  resources,  and  found,  after  a  few  years, 
that  he  had  paid  him  two  hundred  pounds  for  the 
accommodation.  He  met  with  every  variety  of 
absurd  and  disastrous  adventure.  The  mother  of 
a  young  woman  with  whom  he  had  had  an 
innocent  flirtation  in  the  country  appeared  one 


THE  MAKER  OF  MANY  BOOKS.      151 

day  at  his  desk  in  the  office,  and  called  out 
before  all  the  clerks,  "  Anthony  Trollope, 
when  are  you  going  to  marry  my  daughter?" 
On  another  occasion  a  sum  of  money  was  mis 
sing  from  the  table  of  the  director.  Anthony 
was  summoned.  The  director  informed  him  of 
the  loss  —  "  and,  by  G —  !  "  he  continued, 
thundering  his  fist  down  on  the  table,  "  no  one 
has  been  in  the  room  but  you  and  I."  "  Then, 
by  G — !  "  cried  Anthony,  thundering  Ms  fist 
down  upon  something,  "you  have  taken  it!" 
This  was  very  well ;  but  the  thing  which  An 
thony  had  thumped  happened  to  be,  not  a  table, 
but  a  movable  desk  with  an  inkstand  on  it,  and 
the  ink  flew  up  and  deluged  the  face  and  shirt- 
front  of  the  enraged  director.  Still  another  ad 
venture  was  that  of  the  Queen  of  Saxony  and  the 
Half-Crown  ;  but  the  reader  must  investigate 
these  matters  for  himself. 

So  far  there  has  been  nothing  looking  toward 
the  novel-writer.  But  now  we  learn  that  from 
the  age  of  fifteen  to  twenty-six  Anthony  kept  a 
journal,  which,  he  says,  "  convicted  me  of  folly, 
ignorance,  indiscretion,  idleness,  and  conceit,  but 
habituated  me  to  the  rapid  use  of  pen  and  ink, 
and  taught  me  how  to  express  myself  with  facil- 


152  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

ity."  In  addition  to  this,  and  more  to  the  pur 
pose,  he  had  formed  an  odd  habit.  Living,  as  he 
was  forced  to  do,  so  much  to  himself,  if  not  by 
himself,  he  had  to  play,  not  with  other  boys,  but 
with  himself;  and  his  favorite  play  was  to  con 
ceive  a  tale,  or  series  of  fictitious  events,  and  to 
carry  it  on,  day  after  day,  for  months  together,  in 
his  mind.  "Nothing  impossible  was  ever  in 
troduced,  or  violently  improbable.  I  was  my  own 
hero,  but  I  never  became  a  king  or  a  duke,  still 
less  an  Antinous,  or  six  feet  high.  But  I  was  a 
very  clever  person,  and  beautiful  young  women 
used  to  be  very  fond  of  me.  I  learned  in  this 
way  to  live  in  a  world  outside  the  world  of  my 
own  material  life."  This  is  pointedly,  even  touch- 
ingly,  characteristic.  Never,  to  the  day  of  his 
death,  did  Mr.  Trollope  either  see  or  imagine  any 
thing  impossible,  or  violently  improbable,  in  the 
world.  This  mortal  plane  of  things  never  dis 
solved  before  his  gaze  and  revealed  the  mysteries 
of  absolute  Being ;  his  heavens  were  never  rolled 
up  as  a  scroll,  and  his  earth  had  no  bubbles  as  the 
water  hath.  He  took  things  as  he  found  them ; 
and  he  never  found  them  out.  But  if  the  light 
that  never  was  on  sea  or  land  does  not  illuminate 
the  writings  of  Mr.  Trollope,  there  is  generally 


THE  MAKER  OF  MANY  BOOKS.       153 

plenty  of  that   other   kind  of   light   with  which, 
after  all,  the  average  reader  is  more  familiar,  and 
which  not  a  few,  perhaps,  prefer  to  the  transcen 
dental  lustre.     There  is  no  modern  novelist  who 
has  more  clearly  than  Trollope  defined  to  his  own 
apprehension  his  own  literary  capabilities  and  limi 
tations.    He  is  thoroughly  acquainted  with  both  his 
fortes  and  his  foibles ;  and  so  sound  is  his  good  sense, 
that  he  is  seldom  beguiled  into  toiling  with  futile 
ambition  after  effects  that  are  beyond  him.     His 
proper  domain  is  a  sufficiently  wide    one  ;    he  is 
inimitably  at  home  here ;    and   when    he    invites 
us  there  to  visit  him,  we  may  be  sure  of  getting 
good  and  wholesome  entertainment.     The  writer's 
familiarity  with  his  characters  communicates  itself 
imperceptibly  to  the  reader;  there  are  no  difficult 
or  awkward  introductions ;  the  toning  of  the  pict 
ure  (to  use  the  painter's  phrase)  is  unexception 
able  ;  and  if.  it  be  rather  tinted  than  colored,  the 
tints   are    handled    in    a    workmanlike    manner. 
Again,  few  English  novelists  seem  to  possess  so 
sane  a  comprehension  of  the  modes  of  life  and 
thought  of  the    British    aristocracy    as   Trollope. 
He  has  not  only  made  a  study  of  them  from   the 
observer's  point  of  view,  but  he  has  reasoned  them 
out  intellectually.     The  figures  are  not  vividly  de- 


154  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

fined ;  the  realism  is  applied  to  events  rather  than 
to  personages:  we  have  the  scene  described  for 
us  but  we  do  not  look  upon  it.  We  should 
not  recognize  his  characters  if  we  saw  them ; 
but  if  we  were  told  who  they  were,  we  should 
know,  from  their  author's  testimony,  what  were 
their  characteristic  traits  and  how  they  would 
act  under  given  circumstances]  The  logical 
sequence  of  events  is  carefully  maintained; 
nothing  happens,  either  for  good  or  for  evil, 
other  than  might  befall  under  the  dispen 
sations  of  a  Providence  no  more  unjust,  and 
no  more  far-sighted,  than  Trollope  himself. 
There  is  a  good  deal  of  the  a  priori  principle  in 
his  method ;  he  has  made  up  his  mind  as  to  cer 
tain  fundamental  data,  and  thence  develops  or 
explains  whatever  complication  comes  up  for  set 
tlement.  But  to  range  about  unhampered  by  any 
theories,  concerned  only  to  examine  all  phenom 
ena,  and  to  report  thereupon,  careless  of  any  con 
siderations  save  those  of  artistic  propriety,  would 
have  been  vanity  and  striving  after  wind  to  Trol 
lope,  and  derivatively  so,  doubtless,  to  his  readers. 
Considered  in  the  abstract,  it  is  a  curious  ques 
tion  what  makes  his  novels  interesting.  The 
reader  knows,  in  a  sense,  just  what  is  in  store  for 


THE  MAKER  OF  MANY  BOOKS.       155 

him, —  or,  rather,  what  is  not.  There  will  be  no 
astonishment,  no  curdling  horror,  no  consuming 
suspense.  There  may  be,  perhaps,  as  many 
murders,  forgeries,  foundlings,  abductions,  and 
missing  wills,  in  Trollope's  novels  as  in  any 
others ;  but  they  are  not  told  about  in  a  manner  to 
alarm  us ;  we  accept  them  philosophically ;  there 
are  paragraphs  in  our  morning  paper  that  excite 
us  more.  And  yet  they  are  narrated  with  art, 
and  with  dramatic  effect.  They  are  interesting, 
but  not  uncourteously —  not  exasperatingly  so; 
and  the  strangest  part  of  it  is  that  the  introduc 
tory  and  intermediate  passages  are  no  less  inter 
esting,  under  Trollope's  treatment,  than  are  the 
murders  and  forgeries.  Not  only  does  he  never 
offend  the  modesty  of  nature, —  he  encourages  her 
to  be  prudish,  and  trains  her  to  such  evenness  and 
severity  of  demeanor  that  we  never  know  when 
we  have  had  enough  of  her.  His  touch  is  emi 
nently  civilizing ;  everything,  from  the  episodes  to 
the  sentences,  moves  without  hitch  or  creak :  we 
never  have  to  read  a  paragraph  twice,  and  we  are 
seldom  sorry  to  have  read  it  once. 

Amusingly  characteristic  of  Trollope  is  his 
treatment  of  his  villains.  His  attitude  toward 
them  betrays  no  personal  uncharitableness  or 


156  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

animosity,  but  the  villain  has  a  bad  time  of  it  just 
the  same.  Trollope  places  upon  him  a  large,  benev 
olent,  but  unyielding  forefinger,  and  says  to  us: 
"  Remark,  if  you  please,  how  this  inferior  reptile 
squirms  when  pressure  is  applied  to  him.  I  will 
now  augment  the  pressure.  You  observe  that  the 
squirmings  increase  in  energy  and  complexity. 
Now,  if  you  please,  I  will  bear  down  yet  a 
little  harder.  Do  not  be  alarmed,  madam  ;  the 
reptile  undoubtedly  suffers,  but  the  spectacle 
may  do  us  some  good,  and  you  may  trust 
me  not  to  let  him  do  you  any  harm.  There !  — 
Yes,  evisceration  by  means  of  pressure  is  be 
yond  question  painful ;  but  every  one  must  have 
observed  the  benevolence  of  my  forefinger  during 
the  operation  ;  and  I  fancy  even  the  subject  of  the 
experiment  (were  he  in  a  condition  to  express  his 
sentiments)  would  have  admitted  as  much. 
Thank  you,  ladies  and  gentlemen.  I  shall  have 
the  pleasure  of  meeting  you  again  very  shortly. 
John,  another  reptile,  please  !  "  Upon  the  whole, 
it  is  much  to  Trollope's  credit  that  he  wrote 
somewhere  about  fifty  long  novels ;  and  to  the 
credit  of  the  English  people  that  they  paid  him 
three  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  dollars  for  these 
novels  —  and  read  them  ! 


THE  MAKER  OF  MANY  BOOKS.      157 

But  his  success  as  a  man  of  letters  was  still 
many  years  in  the  future.  After  seven  years  in 
the  London  office,  he  went  to  Ireland  as  assistant 
surveyor,  and  thenceforward  he  began  to  enjoy 
his  business,  and  to  get  on  in  it.  He  was  paid 
sixpence  a  mile,  and  he  would  ride  forty  miles  a 
day.  He  rode  to  hounds,  incidentally,  whenever 
he  got  a  chance,  and  he  kept  up  the  practice,  with 
enthusiasm,  to  within  a  few  years  of  his  death. 
"  It  will,  I  think,  be  accorded  to  me,"  he  says, 
"  that  I  have  ridden  hard.  I  know  very  little 
about  hunting ;  I  am  blind,  very  heavy,  and  I  am 
now  old ;  but  I  ride  with  a  boy's  energy,  hating 
the  roads,  and  despising  young  men  who  ride 
them ;  and  I  feel  that  life  cannot  give  me  any 
thing  better  than  when  I  have  gone  through  a 
long  run  to  the  finish,  keeping  a  place,  not  of  glory, 
but  of  credit,  among  my  juniors."  Riding,  work 
ing,  having  a  jolly  time,  and  gradually  increasing 
his  income,  he  lived  until  1842,  when  he  became 
engaged ;  and  he  was  married  on  June  11,  1844. 
"  I  ought  to  name  that  happy  day,"  he  declares, 
"  as  the  commencement  of  my  better  life."  It 
was  at  about  this  date,  also,  that  he  began  and 
finished,  not  without  delay  and  procrastination, 
his  first  novel.  Curiously  enough,  he  affirms  that 


158  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

he  did  not  doubt  his  own  intellectual  sufficiency 
to  write  a  readable  novel:  "What  I  did  doubt 
was  my  own  industry,  and  the  chances  of  a 
market."  Never,  surely,  was  self-distrust  more 
unfounded.  As  for  the  first  novel,  he  sent  it  to 
his  mother,  to  dispose  of  as  best  she  could ;  and  it 
never  brought  him  anything,  except  a  perception 
that  it  was  considered  by  his  friends  to  be  "an 
unfortunate  aggravation  of  the  family  disease." 
During  the  ensuing  ten  years,  this  view  seemed 
to  be  not  unreasonable,  for,  in  all  that  time, 
though  he  worked  hard,  he  earned  by  literature 
no  more  than  £55.  But,  between  1857  and  1860, 
he  received  for  various  novels,  from  £100  to 
£1000  each;  and  thereafter,  £3000  or  more  was 
his  regular  price  for  a  story  in  three  volumes. 
As  he  maintained  his  connection  with  the  post- 
office  until  1867,  he  was  in  receipt  of  an  income 
of  £4500,  "of  which  I  spent  two-thirds  and  put 
by  one."  We  should  be  doing  an  injustice  to 
Mr.  Trollope  to  omit  these  details,  which  he  gives 
so  frankly;  for,  as  he  early  informs  us,  "my  first 
object  in  taking  to  literature  was  to  make  an 
income  on  which  I  and  those  belonging  to  me 
might  live  in  comfort."  Nor  will  he  let  us  forget 
that  novel-writing,  to  him,  was  not  so  much  an 


THE   MAKER   OF   MANY   BOOKS.  159 

art,  or  even  a  profession,  as  a  trade,  in  which  all 
that  can  be  asked  of  a  man  is  that  he  shall  be 
honest  and  punctual,  turning  out  good  average 
work,  and  the  more  the  better.  "  The  great 
secret  consists  in  "  —  in  what  ?  —  why,  "  in  ac 
knowledging  myself  to  be  bound  to  rules  of  labor 
similar  to  those  which  an  artisan  or  mechanic  is 
forced  to  obey."  There  may  be,  however,  other 
incidental  considerations.  "  I  have  ever  thought 
of  myself  as  a  preacher  of  sermons,  and  my  pulpit 
as  one  I  could  make  both  salutary  and  agreeable 
to  my  audience " ;  and  he  tells  us  that  he  has 
used  some  of  his  novels  for  the  expression  of  his 
political  and  social  convictions.  Again  —  "  The 
novelist  must  please,  and  he  must  teach ;  a  good 
novel  should  be  both  realistic  and  sensational  in 
the  highest  degree."  He  says  that  he  sees  no 
reason  why  two  or  three  good  novels  should  not 
be  written  at  the  same  time ;  and  that,  for  his  own 
part,  he  was  accustomed  to  write  two  hundred 
and  fifty  words  every  fifteen  minutes,  by  the 
watch,  during  his  working  hours.  Nor  does  he 
mind  letting  us  know  that  when  he  sits  down  to 
write  a  novel,  he  neither  knows  nor  cares  how  it 
is  to  end.  And  finally,  one  is  a  little  startled  to 
hear  him  say,  epigrammatically,  that  a  writer 


160  CONFESSIONS  AND   CEITICISMS. 

should  not  have  to  tell  a  story,  but  should  have  a 
story  to  tell.  Beyond  a  doubt,  Anthony  Trollope 
is  something  of  a  paradox. 

The  world  has  long  ago  passed  its  judgment 
on  his  stories,  but  it  is  interesting,  all  the  same, 
to  note  his  own  opinion  of  them ;  and  though 
never  arrogant,  he  is  generally  tolerant,  if  not 
genial.  "A  novel  should  be  a  picture  of  com 
mon  life,  enlivened  by  humor  and  sweetened  by 
pathos.  I  have  never  fancied  myself  to  be  a  man 
of  genius,"  he  says ;  but  again,  with  strange  im- 
perviousness,  "  A  small  daily  task,  if  it  be  daily, 
will  beat  the  labors  of  a  spasmodic  Hercules." 
Beat  them,  how  ?  Why,  in  quantity.  But  how 
about  quality?  Is  the  travail  of  a  work  of  art 
the  same  thing  as  the  making  of  a  pair  of  shoes  ? 
Emerson  tells  us  that  — 

"  Ever  the  words  of  the  gods  resound, 

But  the  porches  of  man's  ear 
Seldom,  in  this  low  life's  round, 
Are  unsealed,  that  he  may  hear." 

No  one  disputes,  however,  that  you  may  hear  the 
tapping  of  the  cobbler's  hammer  at  any  time. 

To  the  view  of  the  present  writer,  how  much 
good  soever  Mr.  Trollope  may  have  done  as  a 
preacher  and  moralist,  he  has  done  great  harm  to 


THE  MAKER   OF   MANY  BOOKS.  161 

English  fictitious  literature  by  his  novels;  and  it 
need  only  be  added,  in  this  connection,  that  his 
methods  and  results  in  novel-writing  seem  best  to 
be  explained  by  that  peculiar  mixture  of  separate- 
ness  and  commonplaceness  which  we  began  by  re 
marking  in  him.  The  separateness  has  given  him 
the  standpoint  whence  he  has  been  able  to  observe 
and  describe  the  commonplaceness  with  which  (in 
spite  of  his  separateness)  he  is  in  vital  sympathy. 
But  Trollope  the  man  is  the  abundant  and  con 
soling  compensation  for  Trollope  the  novelist; 
and  one  wishes  that  his  books  might  have  died, 
and  he  lived  on  indefinitely.  It  is  charming  to 
read  of  his  life  in  London  after  his  success  in  the 
Cornhill  Magazine.  "  Up  to  that  time  I  had  lived 
very  little  among  men.  It  was  a  festival  to  me  to 
dine  at  the  4  Garrick.'  I  think  I  became  popular 
among  those  with  whom  I  associated.  I  have 
ever  wished  to  be  liked  by  those  around  me  —  a 
wish  that  during  the  first  half  of  my  life  was 
never  gratified."  And,  again,  in  summing  up  his 
life,  he  says :  "  I  have  betrayed  no  woman. 
Wine  has  brought  to  me  no  sorrow.  It  has  been 
the  companionship,  rather  than  the  habit  of 
smoking  that  I  loved.  I  have  never  desired  to 
win  money,  and  I  have  lost  none.  To  enjoy 


162  CONFESSIONS    AND   CRITICISMS. 

the  excitement  of  pleasure,  but  to  be  free  from 
its  vices  and  ill-effects  —  to  have  the  sweet,  and 
to  leave  the  bitter  untasted  —  that  has  been  my 
study.  I  will  not  say  that  I  have  never  scorched 
a  finger;  but  I  carry  no  ugly  wounds." 

A  man  who,  at  the  end  of  his  career,  could 
make  such  a  profession  as  this  —  who  felt  the  need 
of  no  further  self-vindication  than  this  —  such  a 
man,  whatever  may  have  been  his  accountability 
to  the  muse  of  Fiction,  is  a  credit  to  England  and 
to  human  nature,  and  deserves  to  be  numbered 
among  the  darlings  of  mankind.  It  was  an  honor 
to  be  called  his  friend ;  and  what  his  idea  of 
friendship  was,  may  be  learned  from  the  passage 
in  which  he  speaks  of  his  friend  Millais  —  with 
the  quotation  of  which  this  paper  may  fitly  be 
concluded :  — 

"To  see  him  has  always  been  a  pleasure;  his 
voice  has  always  been  a  sweet  sound  in  my  ears. 
Behind  his  back  I  have  never  heard  him  praised 
without  joining  the  eulogist ;  I  have  never  heard 
a  word  spoken  against  him  without  opposing  the 
censurer.  These  words,  should  he  ever  see  them, 
will  come  to  him  from  the  grave,  and  will  tell 
him  of  my  regard — as  one  living  man  never  tells 
another." 


CHAPTER  VII. 

MR.   MALLOCK'S  MISSING  SCIENCE. 

BEFORE  criticising  Mr.  Mallock's  little  essay, 
let  us  summarize  its  contents.  The  author  be 
gins  with  an  analysis  of  the  aims,  the  principles, 
and  the  "  pseudo-science  "  of  modern  Democracy. 
Having  established  the  evil  and  destructive  char 
acter  of  these  things,  he  sets  himself  to  show  by 
logical  argument  that  the  present  state  of  social 
inequality,  which  Democrats  wish  to  disturb,  is  a 
natural  and  wholesome  state ;  that  the  continu 
ance  of  civilization  is  dependent  upon  it ;  and 
that  it  could  only  be  overturned  by  effecting  a 
radical  change  —  not  in  human  institutions,  but 
in  human  character.  The  desire  for  inequality 
is  inherent  in  the  human  character ;  and  in  order 
to  prove  this  statement,  Mr.  Mallock  proceeds  to 
affirm  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  a  science 
of  human  character;  that  of  this  science  he  is 
the  discoverer;  and  that  the  application  of  this 

163 


164  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

science  to  the  question  at  issue  will  demonstrate 
the  integrity  of  Mr.  Mallock's  views,  and  the  in 
firmity  of  all  others.  In  the  ensuing  chapters 
the  application  is  made,  and  at  the  end  the  truth 
of  the  proposition  is  declared  established. 

This  is  the  outline ;  but  let  us  note  some  of  the 
details.  Mr.  Mallock  asserts  (Chap.  I.)  that  the 
aim  of  modern  Democracy  is  to  overturn  "  all  that 
has  hitherto  been  connected  with  high-breeding 
or  with  personal  culture  "  ;  and  that  "  to  call  the 
Democrats  a  set  of  thieves  and  confiscators  is 
merely  to  apply  names  to  them  which  they  have 
no  wish  to  repudiate."  He  maintains  (Chap.  II.) 
that  the  first  and  foremost  of  the  Democratic 
principles  is  "that  the  perfection  of  society  in 
volves  social  equality";  and  that  "the  luxury  of 
one  man  means  the  deprivation  of  another."  He 
credits  the  Democrats  with  arguing  that  "the 
means  of  producing  equality  are  a  series  of 
changes  in  existing  institutions";  that  "by 
changing  the  institutions  of  a  societ}^  we  are  able 
to  change  its  structure  " ;  that  "  the  cause  of  the 
distribution  of  wealth"  is  "laws  and  forms  of 
government";  and  that  "the  wealthy  classes,  as 
such,  are  connected  with  wealth  in  no  other  way 
but  as  the  accidental  appropriates  of  it."  In 


ME.  MALLOCK'S  MISSING  SCIENCE.        165 

his  third  chapter  he  tells  us  that  "  the  entire 
theory  of  modern  Democracy  .  .  .  depends 
on  the  doctrine  that  the  cause  of  wealth  is  labor  "  ; 
that  Democrats  believe  we  "  may  count  on  a  man 
to  labor,  just  as  surely  as  we  may  count  on  a  man 
to  eat " ;  that  "  the  man  who  does  not  labor  is 
supported  by  the  man  who  does  " ;  and  that  the 
pseudo-science  of  modern  Democracy  "  starts  with 
the  conception  of  man  as  containing  in  himself 
a  natural  tendency  to  labor."  And  here  Mr. 
Mallock's  statement  of  his  opponent's  position 
ends. 

In  the  fourth  chapter  we  are  brought  within 
sight  of  "  The  Missing  Substitute."  "  A  man's 
character,"  we  are  told,  "  divides  into  his  desires 
on  the  one  hand,  and  his  capacities  on  the  other  "  ; 
and  it  is  observed  that  "  various  as  are  men's  de 
sires  and  capacities,  yet  if  talent  and  ambition 
commanded  no  more  than  idleness  and  stupidity, 
all  men  practically  would  be  idle  and  stupid." 
"  Men's  capacities,"  we  are  reminded,  "  are  prac 
tically  unequal,  because  they  develop  their  own 
potential  inequalities ;  they  do  this  because  they 
desire  to  place  themselves  in  unequal  external 
circumstances, —  which  result  the  condition  of 
society  renders  possible." 


166  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

Coming  now  to  the  Science  of  Human  Charac 
ter  itself,  we  find  that  it  "asserts  a  permanent 
relationship  to  exist  between  human  character 
and  social  inequality  " ;  and  the  author  then  pro 
ceeds  at  some  length  to  show  how  near  Herbert 
Spencer,  Buckle,  and  other  social  and  economic 
philosophers,  came  to  stumbling  over  his  missing 
science,  and  yet  avoided  doing  so.  Nevertheless, 
argues  Mr.  Mallock,  "  if  there  be  such  a  thing  as 
a  social  science,  or  a  science  of  history,  there 
must  be  also  a  science  of  biography  " ;  and  this 
science,  though  it  "cannot  show  us  how  any 
special  man  will  act  in  the  future,"  yet,  if  "  any 
special  action  be  given  us,  it  can  show  us  that  it 
was  produced  by  a  special  motive  ;  and  conversely, 
that  if  the  special  motive  be  wanting,  the  special 
action  is  sure  to  be  wanting  also."  As  an  exam 
ple  how  to  distinguish  between  those  traits  of 
human  character  which  are  available  for  scientific 
purposes,  and  those  which  are  not,  Mr.  Mallock 
instances  a  mob,  which  temporarily  acts  together 
for  some  given  purpose  :  the  individual  differences 
of  character  then  "  cancel  out,"  and  only  points 
of  agreement  are  left.  Proceeding  to  the  sixth 
chapter,  he  applies  himself  to  setting  to  rest  the 
scruples  of  those  who  find  something  cynical  in 


ME.   MALLOCK'S   MISSING   SCIENCE.          167 

the  idea  that  the  desire  for  Inequality  is  compat 
ible  with  a  respectable  form  of  human  character. 
It  is  true,  he  says,  that  man  does  not  live  by 
bread  alone ;  but  he  denies  that  he  means  to  say 
"that  all  human  activity  is  motived  by  the  desire 
for  inequality  "  ;  he  would  assert  that  only  "  of  all 
productive  labor,  except  the  lowest."  The  only 
actions  independent  of  the  desire  for  inequality, 
however,  are  those  performed  in  the  name  of  art, 
science,  philanthropy,  and  religion ;  and  even  in 
these  cases,  so  far  as  the  actions  are  not  motived 
by  a  desire  for  inequality,  they  are  not  of  product 
ive  use ;  and  vice  versd.  In  the  remaining  chap 
ters,  which  we  must  dismiss  briefly,  we  meet  with 
such  statements  as  "  labor  has  been  produced  by 
an  artificial  creation  of  want  of  food,  and  by  then 
supplying  the  want  on  certain  conditions " ;  that 
"civilization  has  always  been  begun  by  an  op 
pressive  minority "  ;  that  "  progress  depends  on 
certain  gifted  individuals,"  and  therefore  social 
equality  would  destroy  progress ;  that  inequality 
influences  production  by  existing  as  an  object  of 
desire  and  as  a  means  of  pressure  ;  that  the  evils 
of  poverty  are  caused  by  want,  not  by  inequality ; 
and  that,  finally,  equality  is  not  the  goal  of  pro 
gress,  but  of  retrogression ;  that  inequality  is  not 


168  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

an  accidental  evil  of  civilization,  but  the  cause  of 
its  development;  the  distance  of  the  poor  from 
the  rich  is  not  the  cause  of  the  former's  poverty  as 
distinct  from  riches,  but  of  their  civilized  compe 
tence  as  distinct  from  barbarism ;  and  that  the 
apparent  changes  in  the  direction  of  equality  re 
corded  in  history,  have  been,  in  reality,  none 
other  than  "a  more  efficient  arrangement  of  in 
equalities." 

Now,  let  us  inquire  what  all  this  ingenious 
prattle  about  Inequality  and  the  Science  of  Hu 
man  Character  amounts  to.  What  does  Mr.  Mai- 
lock  expect  ?  His  book  has  been  out  six  months, 
and  still  Democracy  exists.  But  does  any  such 
Democracy  as  he  combats  exist,  or  could  it  con 
ceivably  exist?  Have  his  investigations  of  the 
human  character  failed  to  inform  him  that  one  of 
the  strongest  natural  instincts  of  man's  nature  is 
immovably  opposed  to  anything  like  an  equal  dis 
tribution  of  existing  wealth?  —  because  whoever 
owns  anything,  if  it  be  only  a  coat,  wishes  to  keep 
it ;  and  that  wish  makes  him  aware  that  his  fellow- 
man  will  wish  to  keep,  and  will  keep  at  all  haz 
ards,  whatever  things  belong  to  him.  What  Dem 
ocrats  really  desire  is  to  enable  all  men  to  have 


MB.  MALLOCK'S  MISSING  SCIENCE.       169 

an  equal  chance  to  obtain  wealth,  instead  of 
being,  as  is  largely  the  case  now,  hampered  and 
kept  down  by  all  manner  of  legal  and  arbitrary 
restrictions.  As  for  the  "desire  for  Inequality," 
it  seems  to  exist  chiefly  in  Mr.  Mallock's  imagi 
nation.  Who  does  desire  it?  Does  the  man  who 
"  strikes  "  for  higher  wages  desire  it  ?  Let  us  see. 
A  strike,  to  be  successful,  must  be  not  an  individ 
ual  act,  but  the  act  of  a  large  body  of  men,  all 
demanding  the  same  thing — an  increase  in  wages. 
If  they  gain  their  end,  no  difference  has  taken 
place  in  their  mutual  position ;  and  their  position 
in  regard  to  their  employers  is  altered  only  in 
that  an  approach  has  been  made  toward  greater 
equality  with  the  latter.  And  so  in  other  depart 
ments  of  human  effort:  the  aim,  which  the  man 
who  wishes  to  better  his  position  sets  before  him 
self,  is  not  to  rise  head  and  shoulders  above  his 
equals,  but  to  equal  his  superiors.  And  as  to  the 
Socialist  schemes  for  the  reorganization  of  society, 
they  imply,  at  most,  a  wish  to  see  all  men  start 
fair  in  the  race  of  life,  the  only  advantages  allowed 
being  not  those  of  rank  or  station,  but  solely  of 
innate  capacity.  And  the  reason  the  Socialist 
desires  this  is,  because  he  believes,  rightly  or 
wrongly,  that  many  inefficient  men  are,  at  pres- 


170  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

ent,  only  artificially  protected  from  betraying 
their  inefficiency;  and  that  many  efficient  men 
are  only  artificially  prevented  from  showing  their 
efficiency;  and  that  the  fair  start  he  proposes 
would  not  result  in  keeping  all  men  on  a  dead 
level,  but  would  simply  put  those  in  command 
who  had  a  genuine  right  to  be  there. 

But  this  is  taxing  Mr.  Mallock  too  seriously : 
he  has  not  written  in  earnest.  But,  as  his  uncle, 
Mr.  Froude,  said,  when  reading  "The  New  Re 
public," —  "The  rogue  is  clever!"  He  has  read 
a  good  deal,  he  has  an  active  mind,  a  smooth  re 
dundancy  of  expression,  a  talent  for  caricature,  a 
fondness  for  epigram  and  paradox,  a  useful  shal- 
lowness,  and  an  amusing  impudence.  He  has  no 
practical  knowledge  of  mankind,  no  experience 
of  life,  no  commanding  point  of  view,  and  no 
depth  of  insight.  He  has  no  conception  of  the 
meaning  and  quality  of  the  problems  with  whose 
exterior  aspects  he  so  prettily  trifles.  He  has 
constructed  a  Science  of  Human  Character  with 
out  for  one  moment  being  aware  that,  for  instance, 
human  character  and  human  nature  are  two  dis 
tinct  things ;  and  that,  furthermore,  the  one  is 
everything  that  the  other  is  not.  As  little  is  he 


MR.  MALLOCK'S  MISSING  SCIENCE.       171 

conscious  of  the  significance  of  the  words  "so 
ciety"  and  "civilization";  nor  can  he  explain 
whether,  or  why,  either  of  them  is  desirable  or 
undesirable,  good  or  bad.  He  has  never  done, 
and  (judging  from  his  published  works)  we  do 
not  believe  him  capable  of  doing,  any  analytical 
or  constructive  thinking ;  at  most,  as  in  the  pres 
ent  volume,  he  turns  a  few  familiar  objects  upside 
down,  and  airily  invites  his  audience  to  believe 
that  he  has  thereby  earned  the  name  of  Dis 
coverer,  if  not  of  Creator. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THEODORE  WINTHROP'S  WRITINGS. 

ON  an  accessible  book-shelf  in  my  library,  stand 
side  by  side  four  volumes  whose  contents  I  once 
knew  by  heart,  and  which,  after  the  lapse  of 
twenty  years,  are  yet  tolerably  distinct  in  my 
memory.  These  are  stoutly  bound  in  purple 
muslin,  with  a  stamp,  of  Persian  design  appar 
ently,  on  the  centre  of  each  cover.  They  are 
stained  and  worn,  and  the  backs  have  faded  to  a 
brownish  hue,  from  exposure  to  the  light,  and  a 
leaf  in  one  of  the  volumes  has  been  torn  across; 
but  the  paper  and  the  sewing  and  the  clear  bold 
type  are  still  as  serviceable  as  ever.  The  books 
seem  to  have  been  made  to  last, —  to  stand  a  great 
deal  of  reading.  Contrasted  with  the  resthet- 
ically  designed  covers  one  sees  nowadays,  they 
would  be  considered  inexcusably  ugly,  and  the 
least  popular  novelist  of  our  time  would  protest 
against  having  his  lucubrations  presented  to  the 
public  in  such  plain  attire.  Nevertheless,  on 

172 


THEODOEE  WINTHROP'S   WETTINGS.          173 

turning  to  the  title-pages,  you  may  see  imprinted, 
on  the  first,  "Fourteenth  Edition";  on  the  sec 
ond,  "  Twelfth  Edition " ;  and  on  the  others, 
indications  somewhat  less  magnificent,  but  still 
evidence  of  very  exceptional  circulation.  The 
date  they  bear  is  that  of  the  first  years  of  our 
civil  war;  and  the  first  published  of  them  is 
prefaced  by  a  biographical  memoir  of  the  author, 
written  by  his  friend  George  William  Curtis. 
This  memoir  was  originally  printed  in  the  Atlantic 
Monthly,  two  or  three  months  after  the  death  of 
its  subject,  Theodore  Winthrop. 

For  these  books, —  three  novels,  and  one  volume 
of  records  of  travel, —  came  from  his  hand,  though 
they  did  not  see  the  light  until  after  he  had 
passed  beyond  the  sphere  of  authors  and  pub 
lishers.  At  that  time,  the  country  was  in  an 
exalted  and  heroic  mood,  and  the  men  who  went 
to  fight  its  battles  were  regarded  with  a  personal 
affection  by  no  means  restricted  to  their  personal 
acquaintances.  Their  names  were  on  all  lips,  and 
those  of  them  who  fell  were  mourned  by  multi 
tudes  instead  of  by  individuals.  Winthrop's  his 
toric  name,  and  the  influential  position  of  some 
of  his  nearest  friends,  would  have  sufficed  to 
bring  into  unusual  prominence  his  brief  career 


174  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

and  his  fate  as  a  soldier,  even  had  his  in 
trinsic  qualities  and  character  been  less  honor 
able  and  winning  than  they  were.  But  he  was  a 
type  of  a  young  American  such  as  America  is 
proud  to  own.  He  was  high-minded,  refined, 
gifted,  handsome.  I  recollect  a  portrait  of  him 
published  soon  after  his  death, —  a  photograph,  I 
think,  from  a  crayon  drawing;  an  eloquent,  sen 
sitive,  rather  melancholy,  but  manly  and  cour 
ageous  face,  with  grave  eyes,  the  mouth  veiled 
by  a  long  moustache.  It  was  the  kind  of  coun 
tenance  one  would  wish  our  young  heroes  to 
have.  When,  after  the  catastrophe  at  Great 
Bethel,  it  became  known  that  Winthrop  had 
left  writings  behind  him,  it  would  have  been 
strange  indeed  had  not  every  one  felt  a  desire 
to  read  them. 

Moreover,  he  had  already  begun  to  be  known 
as  a  writer.  It  was  during  1860,  I  believe,  that 
a  story  of  his,  in  two  instalments,  entitled  "  Love 
on  Skates,"  appeared  in  the  "Atlantic."  It  was 
a  brilliant  and  graphic  celebration  of  the  art  of 
skating,  engrafted  on  a  love-tale  as  full  of  romance 
and  movement  as  could  be  desired.  Admirably 
told  it  was,  as  I  recollect  it ;  crisp  with  the  healthy 
vigor  of  American  wintry  atmosphere,  with  bright 


THEODOKE  WINTHROP'S   WRITINGS.         175 

touches  of  humor,  and,  here  and  there,  passages 
of  sentiment,  half  tender,  half  playful.  It  was 
something  new  in  our  literature,  and  gave  promise 
of  valuable  work  to  come.  But  the  writer  was 
not  destined  to  fulfil  the  promise.  In  the  next 
year,  from  the  camp  of  his  regiment,  he  wrote  one 
or  two  admirable  descriptive  sketches,  touching 
upon  the  characteristic  points  of  the  campaigning 
life  which  had  just  begun ;  but,  before  the  last  of 
these  had  become  familiar  to  the  "  Atlantic's " 
readers,  it  was  known  that  it  would  be  the  last. 
Theodore  Winthrop  had  been  killed. 

He  was  only  in  his  thirty-third  year.  He  was 
born  in  New  Haven,  and  had  entered  Yale  Col 
lege  with  the  class  of  '48.  The  A  KE  Fraternity 
was,  I  believe,  founded  in  the  year  of  his  ad 
mission,  and  he  must,  therefore,  have  been  among 
its  earliest  members.  He  was  distinguished  as 
a  scholar,  and  the  traces  of  his  classic  and  philo 
sophical  acquirements  are  everywhere  visible  in 
his  books.  During  the  five  or  six  years  following 
his  graduation,  he  travelled  abroad,  and  in  the 
South  and  West;  a  wild  frontier  life  had  great 
attractions  for  him,  as  he  who  reads  "  John  Brent " 
and  "  The  Canoe  and  the  Saddle  "  need  not  be 
told.  He  tried  his  hand  at  various  things,  but 


176  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

could  settle  himself  to  no  profession, —  an  in 
ability  which  would  have  excited  no  remark  in 
England,  which  has  had  time  to  recognize  the 
value  of  men  of  leisure,  as  such ;  but  which  seems 
to  have  perplexed  some  of  his  friends  in  this 
country.  Be  that  as  it  may,  no  one  had  reason  to 
complain  of  lack  of  energy  and  promptness  on  his 
part  when  patriotism  revealed  a  path  to  Win- 
throp.  He  knew  that  the  time  for  him  had 
come ;  but  he  had  also  known  that  the  world  is 
not  yet  so  large  that  all  men,  at  all  times,  can  lay 
their  hands  upon  the  work  that  is  suitable  for 
them  to  do. 

Let  us,  however,  return  to  the  novels.  They 
appear  to  have  been  written  about  1856  and  1857, 
when  their  author  was  twenty-eight  or  nine  years 
old.  Of  the  order  in  which  they  were  composed 
I  have  no  record;  but,  judging  from  internal  evi 
dence,  I  should  say  that  "  Edwin  Brothertoft " 
came  first,  then  "  Cecil  Dreeme,"  and  then  "  John 
Brent."  The  style,  and  the  quality  of  thought, 
in  the  latter  is  more  mature  than  in  the  others, 
and  its  tone  is  more  fresh  and  wholesome.  In  the 
order  of  publication,  "  Cecil  Dreeme "  was  first, 
and  seems  also  to  have  been  most  widely  read ; 
then  "John  Brent,"  and  then  "Edwin  Brother- 


177 


toft,"  the  scene  of  which  was  laid  in  the  last  cen 
tury.  I  remember  seeing,  at  the  house  of  James 
T.  Fields,  their  publisher,  the  manuscripts  of 
these  books,  carefully  bound  and  preserved.  They 
were  written  on  large  ruled  letter-paper,  and  the 
handwriting  was  very  large,  and  had  a  consid 
erable  slope.  There  were  scarcely  any  correc 
tions  or  erasures;  but  it  is  possible  that  Win- 
throp  made  clean  copies  of  his  stories  after 
composing  them.  Much  of  the  dialogue,  espec 
ially,  bears  evidence  of  having  been  revised,  and 
of  the  author's  having  perhaps  sacrificed  ease  and 
naturalness,  here  and  there,  to  the  craving  for  con 
ciseness  which  has  been  one  of  the  chief  stum 
bling-blocks  in  the  way  of  our  young  writers.  He 
wished  to  avoid  heaviness  and  "padding,"  and 
went  to  the  other  extreme.  He  wanted  to  cut 
loose  from  the  old,  stale  traditions  of  composition, 
and  to  produce  something  which  should  be  new, 
not  only  in  character  and  significance,  but  in 
manner  of  presentation.  He  had  the  ambition  of 
the  young  Hafiz,  who  professed  a  longing  to  "tear 
down  this  tiresome  old  sky."  But  the  old  sky 
has  good  reasons  for  being  what  and  where  it  is, 
and  young  radicals  finally  come  to  perceive  that, 
regarded  from  the  proper  point  of  view,  and  in 


178  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

the  right  spirit,  it  is  not  so  tiresome  after  all. 
Divine  Revelation  itself  can  be  expressed  in  very 
moderate  and  commonplace  language;  and  if 
one's  thoughts  are  worth  thinking,  they  are  worth 
clothing  in  adequate  and  serene  attire. 

But  "  culture,"  and  literature  with  it,  have 
made  such  surprising  advances  of  late,  that  we 
are  apt  to  forget  how  really  primitive  and  unen 
lightened  the  generation  was  in  which  Winthrop 
wrote.  Imagine  a  time  when  Mr.  Henry  James, 
Jr.,  and  Mr.  W.  D.  Howells  had  not  been  heard 
of ;  when  Bret  Harte  was  still  hidden  below  the 
horizon  of  the  far  West ;  when  no  one  suspected 
that  a  poet  named  Aldrich  would  ever  write  a 
story  called  "  Marjorie  Daw  " ;  when,  in  England, 
"  Adam  Bede  "  and  his  successors  were  unborn ; 
—  a  time  of  antiquity  so  remote,  in  short,  that  the 
mere  possibility  of  a  discussion  upon  the  relative 
merit  of  the  ideal  and  the  realistic  methods  of  fic 
tion  was  undreamt  of !  What  had  an  unfortu 
nate  novelist  of  those  days  to  fall  back  upon? 
Unless  he  wished  to  expatriate  himself,  and  follow 
submissively  in  the  well  worn  steps  of  Dickens, 
Thackeray,  and  Trollope,  the  only  models  he 
could  look  to  were  Washington  Irving,  Edgar 
Allan  Poe,  James  Fenimore  Cooper,  and  Nathan- 


THEODORE  WINTHKOP'S   WRITINGS.         179 

iel  Hawthorne.  "  Elsie  Venner "  had  scarcely 
made  its  appearance  at  that  date.  Irving  and 
Cooper  were,  on  the  other  hand,  somewhat  anti 
quated.  Poe  and  Hawthorne  were  men  of  very 
peculiar  genius,  and,  however  deep  the  impression 
they  have  produced  on  our  literature,  they  have 
never  had,  because  they  never  can  have,  imitators. 
As  for  the  author  of  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,"  she  was 
a  woman  in  the  first  place,  and,  in  the  second  place, 
she  sufficiently  filled  the  field  she  had  selected.  A 
would-be  novelist,  therefore,  possessed  of  ambi 
tion,  and  conscious  of  not  being  his  own  father  or 
grandfather,  saw  an  untrodden  space  before  him, 
into  which  he  must  plunge  without  support  and 
without  guide.  No  wonder  if,  at  the  outset,  he 
was  a  trifle  awkward  and  ill-at-ease,  and,  like  a 
raw  recruit  under  fire,  appeared  affected  from  the 
very  desire  he  felt  to  look  unconcerned.  It  is 
much  to  his  credit  that  he  essayed  the  venture  at 
all ;  and  it  is  plain  to  be  seen  that,  with  each  for 
ward  step  he  took,  his  self-possession  and  sim 
plicity  increased.  If  time  had  been  given  him, 
there  is  no  reason  to  doubt  that  he  might  have 
been  standing  at  the  head  of  our  champions  of 
fiction  to-day. 

But  time  was  not  given  him,  and  his  work,  like 


180  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

all  other  work,  if  it  is  to  be  judged  at  all,  must 
be  judged  on  its  merits.  He  excelled  most  in 
passages  descriptive  of  action ;  and  the  more  vigor 
ous  and  momentous  the  action,  the  better,  invaria 
bly,  was  the  description ;  he  rose  to  the  occasion, 
and  was  not  defeated  by  it.  Partly  for  this  rea 
son,  "Cecil  Dreeme,"  the  most  popular  of  his 
books,  seems  to  me  the  least  meritorious  of  them 
all.  The  story  has  little  movement ;  it  stagnates 
round  Chrysalis  College.  The  love  intrigue  is 
morbid  and  unwholesome,  and  the  characters 
(which  are  seldom  Winthrop's  strong  point)  are 
more  than  usually  artificial  and  unnatural.  The 
dramatis  personce  are,  indeed,  little  more  than 
moral  or  immoral  principles  incarnate.  There  is 
no  growth  in  them,  no  human  variableness  or 
complexity;  it  is  " Every  Man  in  his  Humor" 
over  again,  with  the  humor  left  out.  Densdeth 
is  an  impossible  rascal ;  Churm,  a  scarcely  more 
possible  Rhadamanthine  saint.  Cecil  Dreeme  her 
self  never  fully  recovers  from  the  ambiguity  forced 
upon  her  by  her  masculine  attire;  and  Emma 
Denman  could  never  have  been  both  what  we  are 
told  she  was,  and  what  she  is  described  as  being. 
As  for  Robert  Byng,  the  supposed  narrator  of  the 
tale,  his  name  seems  to  have  been  given  him  in 


THEODORE  WINTHROP'S   WRITINGS.         181 

order  wantonly  to  increase  the  confusion  caused 
by  the  contradictory  traits  with  which  he  is  ac 
credited.     The  whole  atmosphere  of  the  story  is 
unreal,  fantastic,  obscure.     An   attempt  is  made 
to  endow  our  poor,  raw  New  York  with  some 
thing  of  the  stormy  and  ominous  mystery  of  the 
immemorial  cities  of  Europe.     The  best  feature  of 
the  book  (morbidness  aside)  is  the  construction  of 
the  plot,  which  shows  ingenuity  and  an  artistic 
perception  of  the  value  of  mystery  and  moral 
compensation.      It  recalls,  in  some  respects,  the 
design  of  Hawthorne's  "Blithedale  Romance,"—- 
that  is,  had  the  latter  never  been  written,  the 
former   would  probably  have   been  written   dif 
ferently.     In  spite  of  its  faults,  it  is  an  interest 
ing  book,  and,  to  the  critical  eye,  there  are   in 
almost  every  chapter  signs  that  indicate  the  pos 
session  of  no  ordinary  gifts  on  the  author's  part. 
But  it  may  be  doubted  whether  the  special  cir 
cumstances   under  which  it   was   published   had 
not   something  to   do  with  its  wide   popularity. 
I   imagine   "John   Brent"   to  have   been   really 
much  more  popular,  in  the  better  sense;  it  was 
read  and  liked  by  a  higher  class  of  readers.      It 
is  young  ladies   and  school-girls  who   swell  the 
numbers  of  an  "  edition,"  and  hence  the  difficulty 


182  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

in  arguing  from  this  as  to  the  literary  merit   of 
the  book  itself. 

"Edwin  Brothertoft,"  though  somewhat  dis 
jointed  in  construction,  and  jerky  in  style,  is  yet 
a  picturesque  and  striking  story  ;  and  the  gallop 
of  the  hero  across  country  and  through  the  night 
to  rescue  from  the  burning  house  the  woman  who 
had  been  false  to  him,  is  vigorously  described,  and 
gives  us  some  foretaste  of  the  thrill  of  suspense 
and  excitement  we  feel  in  reading  the  story  of  the 
famous  "  Gallop  of  three  "  in  "  John  Brent."  The 
writer's  acquaintance  with  the  history  of  the  pe 
riod  is  adequate,  and  a  romantic  and  chivalrous 
tone  is  preserved  throughout  the  volume.  It  is 
worth  noting  that,  in  all  three  of  Winthrop's 
novels,  a  horse  bears  a  part  in  the  crisis  of  the  tale. 
In  "  Cecil  Dreeme  "  it  is  Churm's  pair  of  trotters 
that  convey  the  party  of  rescuers  to  the  private 
Insane  Asylum  in  which  Densdeth  had  confined 
the  heroine.  In  "Edwin  Brothertoft,"  it  is  one  of 
Edwin's  renowned  breed  of  white  horses  that  car 
ries  him  through  almost  insuperable  obstacles  to 
his  goal.  In  "John  Brent,"  the  black  stallion,  Don 
Fulano,  who  is  throughout  the  chief  figure  in  the 
book,  reaches  his  apogee  in  the  tremendous  race 
across  the  plains  and  down  the  rocky  gorge  of  the 


THEODORE  WINTHROP'S   WRITINGS.         183 

mountains,  to  where  the  abductors  of  the  heroine 
are  just  about  to  pitch  their  camp  at  the  end  of 
their  day's  journey.  The  motive  is  fine  and  ar 
tistic,  and,  in  each  of  the  books,  these  incidents 
are  as  good  as.  or  better  then,  anything  else  in 
the  narrative. 

"  John  Brent "  is,  in  fact,  full  enough  of  merit 
to  more  than  redeem  its  defects.  The  self-con 
sciousness  of  the  writer  is  less  noticeable  than  in 
the  other  works,  and  the  effort  to  be  epigram 
matic,  short,  sharp,  and  "telling"  in  style,  is 
considerably  modified.  The  interest  is  lively, 
continuous,  and  cumulative;  and  there  is  just 
enough  tragedy  in  the  story  to  make  the  happy 
ending  all  the  happier.  It  was  a  novel  and  adven 
turous  idea  to  make  a  horse  the  hero  of  a  tale, 
and  the  manner  in  which  the  idea  is  carried  out 
more  than  justifies  the  hazard.  Winthrop,  as  we 
know,  was  an  ideal  horseman,  and  knows  what  he 
is  writing  about.  He  contrives  to  realize  Don 
Fulano  for  us,  in  spite  of  the  almost  supernatural 
powers  and  intelligence  that  he  ascribes  to  the 
gallant  animal.  One  is  willing  to  stretch  a  point 
of  probability  when  such  a  dashing  and  inspiring 
end  is  in  view.  In  the  present  day  we  are  getting 
a  little  tired  of  being  brought  to  account,  at  every 


184  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

turn,  by  Old  Prob.,  who  tyrannizes  over  literature 
quite  as  much  as  over  the  weather.  Theodore 
Winthrop's  inspiration,  in  this  instance  at  least, 
was  strong  and  genuine  enough  to  enable  him  to 
feel  what  he  was  telling  as  the  truth,  and  there 
fore  it  produces  an  effect  of  truth  upon  the  reader. 
How  distinctly  every  incident  of  that  ride  remains 
stamped  on  the  memory,  even  after  so  long  an 
interval  as  has  elapsed  since  it  was  written !  And 
I  recollect  that  one  of  the  youthful  devourers  of 
this  book,  who  was  of  an  artistic  turn,  was  moved 
to  paint  three  little  water-color  pictures  of  the 
Gallop;  the  first  showing  the  three  horses,  —  the 
White,  the  Gray,  and  the  Black,  scouring  across 
the  prairie,  towards  the  barrier  of  mountains 
behind  which  the  sun  was  setting ;  the  second 
depicting  Don  Fulano,  with  Dick  Wade  and  John 
Brent  on  his  back,  plunging  down  the  gorge  upon 
the  abductors,  one  of  whom  had  just  pulled  the 
trigger  of  his  rifle ;  while  the  third  gives  the  scene 
in  which  the  heroic  horse  receives  his  death- 
wound  in  carrying  the  fugitive  across  the  creek 
away  from  his  pursuers.  At  this  distance  of  time, 
1  am  unable  to  bear  any  testimony  as  to  the  tech 
nical  value  of  the  little  pictures  ;  I  am  inclined  to 
fancy  that  they  would  have  to  be  taken  cum  grano 


THEODORE   WINTHKOP'S   WRITINGS.          185 

amoris,  as  they  certainly  were  executed  con  amore. 
But,  however  that  may  be,  the  instance  (which 
was  doubtless  only  one  of  many  analogous  to  it) 
shows  that  Winthrop  possessed  the  faculty  of  stim 
ulating  and  electrifying  the  imagination  of  his 
readers,  which  all  our  recent  improvements  in  the 
art  and  artifice  of  composition  have  not  made  too 
common,  and  for  which,  if  for  nothing  else,  we 
might  well  feel  indebted  to  him. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

EMERSON  AS  AN   AMERICAN. 

IT  is  not  with  Americans  as  with  other  peoples. 
Our  position  is  more  vague  and  difficult,  because 
it  is  not  primarily  related  to  the  senses.  I  can 
easily  find  out  where  England  or  Prussia  is,  and 
recognize  an  Englishman  or  German  when  we 
meet ;  but  we  Americans  are  not,  to  the  same  ex 
tent  as  these,  limited  by  geographical  and  physi 
cal  boundaries.  The  origin  of  America  was  not 
like  that  of  the  European  nations ;  the  latter  were 
born  after  the  flesh,  but  we  after  the  spirit.  It  is 
of  the  first  consequence  to  them  that  their  fron 
tiers  should  be  defended,  and  their  nationality 
kept  distinct.  But,  though  I  esteem  highly  all 
our  innumerable  square  miles  of  East  and  West, 
North  and  South,  and  our  Pacific  and  Atlantic 
coasts,  I  cannot  help  deeming  them  quite  a 
secondary  consideration.  If  America  is  not  a 
great  deal  more  than  these  United  States,  then 
the  United  States  are  no  better  than  a  penal 

186 


EMERSON  AS  AN  AMERICAN.  187 

colony.  It  is  convenient,  no  doubt,  for  a  great 
idea  to  find  a  great  embodiment — a  suitable  in 
carnation  and  stage ;  but  the  idea  does  not  de 
pend  upon  these  things.  It  is  an  accidental  —  or, 
I  would  rather  say,  a  Providential  —  matter  that 
the  Puritans  came  to  New  England,  or  that 
Columbus  discovered  the  continent  in  time  for 
them ;  but  it  has  always  happened  that  when  a 
soul  is  born  it  finds  a  body  ready  fitted  to  it. 
The  body,  however,  is  an  instrument  merely ;  it 
enables  the  spirit  to  take  hold  of  its  mortal  life, 
just  as  the  hilt  enables  us  to  grasp  the  sword.  If 
the  Puritans  had  not  come  to  New  England, 
still  the  spirit  that  animated  them  would  have 
lived,  and  made  itself  a  place  somehow.  And,  in 
fact,  how  many  Puritans,  for  how  many  ages  pre 
vious,  had  been  trying  to  find  standing-room  in 
the  world,  and  failed  !  They  called  themselves 
by  many  names ;  their  voices  were  heard  in  many 
countries ;  the  time  had  not  yet  come  for  them  to 
be  born  —  to  touch  their  earthly  inheritance ;  but, 
meantime,  the  latent  impetus  was  accumulating, 
and  the  Mayflower  was  driven  across  the  Atlantic 
by  it  at  last.  Nor  is  this  all  —  the  Mayflower  is 
sailing  still  between  the  old  world  and  the  new. 
Every  day  it  brings  new  settlers,  if  not  to  our 


188  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

material  harbors  —  to  our  Boston  Bay,  our  Castle 
Garden,  our  Golden  Gate  —  at  any  rate,  to  our 
mental  ports  and  wharves.  We  cannot  take  up  a 
European  newspaper  without  finding  an  Ameri 
can  idea  in  it.  It  is  said  that  a  great  many  of 
our  countrymen  take  the  steamer  to  England 
every  summer.  But  they  come  back  again ;  and 
they  bring  with  them  many  who  come  to  stay.  I 
do  not  refer  specially  to  the  occupants  of  the 
steerage  —  the  literal  emigrants.  One  cannot  say 
much  about  them  —  they  may  be  Americans  or 
not,  as  it  turns  out.  But  England  and  the  conti 
nent  are  full  of  Americans  who  were  born  there, 
and  many  of  whom  will  die  there.  Sometimes 
they  are  better  Americans  than  the  New  Yorker 
or  the  Bostonian  who  lives  in  Beacon  Street  or 
the  Bowery  and  votes  in  the  elections.  They 
may  be  born  and  reside  where  they  please,  but 
they  belong  to  us,  and,  in  the  better  sense,  they 
are  among  us.  Broadway  and  Washington 
Street,  Vermont  and  Colorado  extend  all  over 
Europe.  Russia  is  covered  with  them ;  she  tries 
to  shove  them  away  to  Siberia,  but  in  vain.  We 
call  mountains  and  prairies  solid  facts ;  but  the 
geography  of  the  mind  is  infinitely  more  stub 
born.  I  dare  say  there  are  a  great  many  oblique- 


EMERSON  AS   AN  AMERICAN.  189 

eyed,  pig-tailed  New  Englanders  in  the  Celestial 
Empire.  They  may  never  have  visited  these 
shores,  or  even  heard  of  them  ;  but  what  of  that  ? 
They  think  our  thought — they  have  apprehended 
our  idea,  and,  by  and  by,  they  or  their  heirs  will 
cause  it  to  prevail. 

It  is  useless  for  us  to  hide  our  heads  in  the 
grass  and  refuse  to  rise  to  the  height  of  our  occa 
sion.  We  are  here  as  the  realization  of  a  truth  — 
the  fulfilment  of  a  prophecy;  we  must  attest  a 
new  departure  in  the  moral  and  intellectual  de 
velopment  of  the  human  race ;  for  whichever  of 
us  does  not,  must  suffer  annihilation.  If  I  deny 
my  birthright  as  an  American,  I  shall  disappear 
and  not  be  missed,  for  an  American  will  take  my 
place.  It  is  not  altogether  a  luxurious  position  to 
find  yourself  in.  You  cannot  sit  still  and  hold 
your  hands.  All  manner  of  hard  and  unpleasant 
things  are  expected  of  you,  which  you  neglect  at 
your  peril.  It  is  like  the  old  fable  of  the  mer 
maid.  She  loved  a  mortal  youth,  and,  in  order 
that  she  might  win  his  affection,  she  prayed  that 
she  might  have  the  limbs  and  feet  of  a  human 
maiden.  Her  prayer  was  answered,  and  she  met 
her  prince ;  but  every  step  she  took  was  as  if  she 
trod  on  razors.  It  is  a  fine  thing  to  sit  in  your 


190  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

chair  and  reflect  on  being  an  American ;  but 
when  you  have  to  rise  up  and  do  an  American's 
duty  before  the  world  —  how  sharp  the  razors 
are ! 

Of  course,  we  do  not  always  endure  the  test ; 
the  flesh  and  blood  on  this  side  of  the  planet  is 
not,  so  far  as  I  have  observed,  of  a  quality  essen 
tially  different  from  that  on  the  other.  Possibly 
our  population  is  too  many  for  us.  Out  of  fifty 
million  people  it  would  be  strange  if  here  and 
there  one  appeared  who  was  not  at  all  points  a 
hero.  Indeed,  I  am  sometimes  tempted  to  think 
that  that  little  band  of  original  Mayflower  Pil 
grims  has  not  greatly  multiplied  since  their  disem 
barkation.  However  it  may  be  with  their  bodily 
offspring,  their  spiritual  progeny  are  not  invaria 
bly  found  in  the  chair  of  the  Governor  or  on  the 
floor  of  the  Senate.  What  are  these  Irish  fellow- 
creatures  doing  here?  Well,  Bridget  serves  us 
in  the  kitchen ;  but  Patrick  is  more  helpful  yet ; 
he  goes  to  the  legislature,  and  is  the  servant  of 
the  people  at  large.  It  is  very  obliging  of  him ; 
but  turn  and  turn  about  is  fair  play ;  and  it  would 
be  no  more  than  justice  were  we,  once  in  a  while, 
to  take  off  our  coat  and  serve  Patrick  in  the 
same  way. 


EMERSON  AS   AN   AMERICAN.  191 

When  we  get  into  a  tight  place  we  are  apt  to 
try   to  slip  out   of  it  under  some  plea  of  a  Eu 
ropean   precedent.     But  it  used  to  be  supposed 
that   it  was  precisely  European  precedents  that 
we  came  over  here  to  avoid.     I  am  not  profoundly 
versed  in  political  economy,  nor  is  this  the  time 
or  place  to  discuss  its  principles ;  but,  as  regards 
protection,    for    example,    I    can    conceive   that 
there  may  be  arguments  against  it  as  well  as  for 
it.     Emerson  used  to  say  that  the  way  to  conquer 
the  foreign  artisan  was  not  to  kill  him  but  to  beat 
his  work.     He  also  pointed  out  that  the  money 
we  made  out  of  the  European  wars,  at  the  be 
ginning  of  this  century,  had  the  result  of  bring 
ing     the      impoverished     population      of     those 
countries  down  upon  us  in  the   shape    of    emi 
grants.     They  shared  our  crops  and  went  on  the 
poor-rates,  and  so  we  did  not  gain  so  much  after 
all.       One    cannot    help    wishing   that   America 
would  assume  the  loftiest  possible  ground  in  her 
political  and  commercial  relations.     With  all  due 
respect  to  the  sagacity  and  ability  of  our  ruling 
demagogues,  I  should  not  wish  them  to  be  quoted 
as  typical  Americans.     The  domination  of  such 
persons  has  an  effect  which  is  by  no  means  measu 
rable  by  their  personal  acts.     What  they  can  do 


192  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

is  of  infinitesimal  importance.  But  the  mischief 
is  that  they  incline  every  one  of  us  to  believe,  as 
Emerson  puts  it,  in  two  gods.  They  make  the 
morality  of  Wall  Street  and  the  White  House 
seem  to  be  a  different  thing  from  that  of  our 
parlors  and  nurseries.  "  He  may  be  a  little  shady 
on  'change,"  we  say,  "  but  he  is  a  capital  fellow 
when  you  know  him."  But  if  he  is  a  capital  fel 
low  when  I  know  him,  then  I  shall  never  find 
much  fault  with  his  professional  operations,  and 
shall  end,  perhaps,  by  allowing  him  to  make 
some  investments  for  me.  Why  should  not  I  be 
a  capital  fellow  too  —  and  a  fellow  of  capital,  to 
boot!  I  can  endure  public  opprobrium  with 
tolerable  equanimity  so  long  as  it  remains  public. 
It  is  the  private  cold  looks  that  trouble  me. 

In  short,  we  may  speak  of  America  in  two 
senses  —  either  meaning  the  America  that  actually 
meets  us  at  the  street  corners  and  in  the  news 
papers,  or  the  ideal  America  —  America  as  it 
ought  to  be.  They  are  not  the  same  thing ;  and, 
at  present,  there  seems  to  be  a  good  deal  more  of 
the  former  than  of  the  latter.  And  yet,  there  is 
a  connection  between  them ;  the  latter  has  made 
the  former  possible.  We  sometimes  see  a  great 
crowd  drawn  together  by  proclamation,  for  some 


EMERSON  AS   AN  AMERICAN.  193 

noble  purpose  —  to  decide  upon  a  righteous  war, 
or  to  pass  a  just  decree.  But  the  people  on  the 
outskirts  of  the  crowd,  finding  themselves  unable 
to  hear  the  orators,  and  their  time  hanging  idle 
on  their  hands,  take  to  throwing  stones,  knocking 
off  hats,  or,  perhaps,  picking  pockets.  They  may 
have  come  to  the  meeting  with  as  patriotic  or  vir 
tuous  intentions  as  the  promoters  themselves; 
nay,  under  more  favorable  circumstances,  they 
might  themselves  have  become  promoters.  Virtue 
and  patriotism  are  not  private  property;  at  cer 
tain  times  any  one  may  possess  them.  And,  on 
the  other  hand,  we  have  seen  examples  enough,  of 
late,  of  persons  of  the  highest  respectability  and 
trust  turning  out,  all  at  once,  to  be  very  sorry 
scoundrels.  A  man  changes  according  to  the  per 
son  with  whom  he  converses ;  and  though  the 
outlook  is  rather  sordid  to-day,  we  have  not  for 
gotten  that  during  the  Civil  War  the  air  seemed 
full  of  heroism.  So  that  these  two  Americas  — 
the  real  and  the  ideal  —  far  apart  though  they 
may  be  in  one  sense,  may,  in  another  sense,  be  as 
near  together  as  our  right  hand  to  our  left.  In  a 
greater  or  less  degree,  they  exist  side  by  side  in 
each  one  of  us.  But  civil  wars  do  not  come  every 
day ;  nor  can  we  wish  them  to,  even  to  show  us 


194  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

once  more  that  we  are  worthy  of  our  destiny. 
We  must  find  some  less  expensive  and  quieter 
method  of  reminding  ourselves  of  that.  And  of 
such  methods,  none,  perhaps,  is  better  than  to 
review  the  lives  of  Americans  who  were  truly 
great ;  to  ask  what  their  country  meant  to  them ; 
what  they  wished  her  to  become;  what  virtues 
and  what  vices  they  detected  in  her.  Passion 
may  be  generous,  but  passion  cannot  last;  and 
when  it  is  over,  we  are  cold  and  indifferent  again. 
But  reason  and  example  reach  us  when  we  are 
calm  and  passive ;  and  what  they  inculcate  is 
more  likely  to  abide.  At  least,  it  will  be  only 
evil  passion  that  can  cast  it  out. 

I  have  said  that  many  a  true  American  is 
doubtless  born,  and  lives,  abroad ;  but  that  does 
not  prevent  Emerson  from  having  been  born  here. 
So  far  as  the  outward  accidents  of  generation  and 
descent  go,  he  could  not  have  been  more  Amer 
ican  than  he  was.  Of  course,  one  prefers  that  it 
should  be  so.  A  rare  gem  should  be  fitly  set. 
A  noble  poem  should  be  printed  with  the  fairest 
type  of  the  Riverside  Press,  and  upon  fine  paper 
with  wide  margins.  It  helps  us  to  believe  in  our 
selves  to  be  told  that  Emerson's  ancestry  was  not 
only  Puritan,  but  clerical;  that  the  central  and 


EMERSON   AS   AN  AMERICAN.  195 

vital  thread  of  the  idea  that  created  us,  ran 
through  his  heart.  The  nation,  and  even  New 
England,  Massachusetts,  Boston,  have  many  traits 
that  are  not  found  in  him ;  but  there  is  nothing 
in  him  that  is  not  a  refinement,  a  sublimation  and 
concentration  of  what  is  good  in  them ;  and  the 
selection  and  grouping  of  the  elements  are  such 
that  he  is  a  typical  figure.  Indeed,  he  is  all  type ; 
which  is  the  same  as  saying  that  there  is  nobody 
like  him.  And,  mentally,  he  produces  the  im 
pression  of  being  all  force ;  in  his  writings,  his 
mind  seems  to  have  acted  immediately,  without 
natural  impediment  or  friction ;  as  if  a  machine 
should  be  run  that  was  not  hindered  by  the  con 
tact  of  its  parts.  As  he  was  physical^  lean  and 
narrow  of  figure,  and  his  face  nothing  but  so 
many  features  welded  together,  so  there  was  no 
adipose  tissue  in  his  thought.  It  is  pure,  clear, 
and  accurate,  and  has  the  fault  of  dryness ;  but 
often  moves  in  forms  of  exquisite  beauty.  It  is 
not  adhesive ;  it  sticks  to  nothing,  nor  anything 
to  it ;  after  ranging  through  all  the  various  philos 
ophies  of  the  world,  it  comes  out  as  clean  and 
characteristic  as  ever.  It  has  numberless  affin 
ities,  but  no  adhesion ;  it  does  not  even  adhere  to 
itself.  There  are  many  separate  statements  in 


196  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

any  one  of  his  essays  which  present  no  logical 
continuity;  but  although  this  fact  has  caused 
great  anxiety  to  many  disciples  of  Emerson,  it 
never  troubled  him.  It  was  the  inevitable  result 
of  his  method  of  thought.  Wandering  at  will  in 
the  flower-garden  of  religious  and  moral  philos 
ophy,  it  was  his  part  to  pluck  such  blossoms  as  he 
saw  were  beautiful;  not  to  find  out  their  botanical 
interconnection.  He  would  afterward  arrange 
them,  for  art  or  harmony's  sake,  according  to 
their  color  or  their  fragrance  ;  but  it  was  not  his 
affair  to  go  any  farther  in  their  classification. 

This  intuitive  method  of  his,  however  little  it 
may  satisfy  those  who  wish  to  have  all  their 
thinking  done  for  them,  who  desire  not  only  to 
have  given  to  them  all  the  cities  of  the  earth, 
but  also  to  have  straight  roads  built  for  them 
from  one  to  the  other,  carries  with  it  its  own 
justification.  "  There  is  but  one  reason,"  is  Emer 
son's  saying ;  and  again  and  again  does  he  prove 
without  proving  it.  We  confess,  over  and  over, 
that  the  truth  which  he  asserts  is  indeed  a  truth. 
Even  his  own  variations  from  the  truth,  when  he 
is  betrayed  into  them,  serve  to  confirm  the  rule. 
For  these  are  seldom  or  never  intuitions  at  first 
hand  — pure  intuitions  ;  but,  as  it  were,  intuitions 


EMERSON   AS   AN   AMERICAN.  197 

from  previous  intuitions  —  deductions.  The  form 
of  statement  is  the  same,  but  the  source  is  dif 
ferent;  they  are  from  Emerson,  instead  of  from 
the  Absolute;  tinted,  not  colorless.  They  show 
a  mental  bias,  very  slight,  but  redeeming  him 
back  to  humanity.  We  love  him  the  more  for 
them,  because  they  indicate  that  for  him,  too, 
there  was  a  choice  of  ways,  and  that  he  must 
struggle  and  watch  to  choose  the  right. 

We  are  so  much  wedded  to  systems,  and  so 
accustomed  to  connect  a  system  with  a  man,  that 
the  absence  of  system,  either  explicit  or  implicit, 
in  Emerson,  strikes  us  as  a  defect.  And  yet 
truth  has  no  system,  nor  the  human  mind.  This 
philosopher  maintains  one,  that  another  thesis. 
Both  are  true  essentially,  and  yet  there  seems  a 
contradiction  between  them.  We  cannot  bear  to 
be  illogical,  and  so  we  enlist  some  under  this 
banner,  some  under  that.  By  so  doing  we  sac 
rifice  to  consistency  at  least  the  half  of  truth. 
Thence  we  come  to  examine  our  intuitions,  and 
ask  them,  not  whether  they  are  true  in  them 
selves,  but  what  are  their  tendencies.  If  it  turn 
out  that  they  will  lead  us  to  stultify  some  past 
conclusion  to  which  we  stand  committed,  we  drop 
them  like  hot  coals.  To  Emerson,  this  behavior 


198  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

appeared  the  nakedest  personal  vanity.  Recog 
nizing  that  he  was  finite,  he  could  not  desire  to  be 
consistent.  If  he  saw  to-day  that  one  thing  was 
true,  and  to-morrow  that  its  opposite  was  true, 
was  it  for  him  to  elect  which  of  the  two  truths 
should  have  his  preference  ?  No  ;  to  reject  either 
would  be  to  reject  all ;  it  belonged  to  God  alone 
to  reconcile  these  contradictions.  Between  in 
finite  and  finite  can  be  no  ratio ;  and  the  consis 
tency  of  the  Creator  implies  the  inconsistency  of 
the  creature. 

Emerson's  Americanism,  therefore,  was  Amer 
icanism  in  its  last  and  purest  analysis,  which  is 
giving  him  high  praise,  and  to  America  great 
hope.  But  I  do  not  mean  to  pay  him,  who  was 
so  full  of  modesty  and  humility,  the  ungrateful 
compliment  of  holding  him  up  as  the  permanent 
American  ideal.  It  is  his  tendencies,  his  quality, 
that  are  valuable,  and  only  in  a  minor,  incipient 
degree  his  actual  results.  All  human  results 
must  be  strictly  limited,  and  according  to  the 
epoch  and  outlook.  Emerson  does  not  solve  for 
all  time  the  problem  of  the  universe ;  he  solves 
nothing;  but  he  does  what  is  far  more  useful  — 
he  gives  a  direction  and  an  impetus  to  lofty 
human  endeavor.  He  does  not  anticipate  the  les- 


EMERSON  AS  AN  AMERICAN.  199 

sons  and  the  discipline  of  the  ages,  but  he  shows  us 
how  to  deal  with  circumstances  in  such  a  manner 
as  to  secure  the  good  instead  of  the  evil  influence. 
New  conditions,  fresh  discoveries,  unexpected 
horizons  opening  before  us,  will,  no  doubt,  soon 
carry  us  beyond  the  scope  of  Emerson's  surmise ; 
but  we  shall  not  so  easily  improve  upon  his  aim 
and  attitude.  In  the  spaces  beyond  the  stars 
there  may  be  marvels  such  as  it  has  not  entered 
into  the  mind  of  man  to  conceive  ;  but  there,  as 
here,  the  right  way  to  look  will  still  be  upward, 
and  the  right  aspiration  be  still  toward  humble 
ness  and  charity. 

I  have  just  spoken  of  Emerson's  absence  of 
system ;  but  his  writings  have  nevertheless  a 
singular  coherence,  by  virtue  of  the  single-hearted 
motive  that  has  inspired  them.  Many  will,  doubt 
less,  have  noticed,  as  I  have  done,  how  the  whole 
of  Emerson  illustrates  every  aspect  of  him. 

Whether  your  discourse  be  of  his  religion,  of 
his  ethics,  of  his  relation  to  society,  or  what  not, 
the  picture  that  you  draw  will  have  gained  color 
and  form  from  every  page  that  he  has  written. 
He  does  not  lie  in  strata ;  all  that  he  is  permeates 
all  that  he  has  done.  His  books  cannot  be  in 
dexed,  unless  you  would  refer  every  subject  to 


200  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

each  paragraph.  And  so  he  cannot  treat,  no 
matter  what  subject,  without  incorporating  in  his 
statement  the  germs  at  least  of  all  that  he  has 
thought  and  believed.  In  this  respect  he  is  like 
light  — the  presence  of  the  general  at  the  partic 
ular.  And,  to  confess  the  truth,  I  find  myself 
somewhat  loath  to  diffract  this  pure  ray  to  the 
arbitrary  end  of  my  special  topic.  Why  should  I 
speak  of  him  as  an  American  ?  That  is  not  his 
definition.  He  was  an  American  because  he  was 
himself.  America,  however,  gives  less  limitation 
than  any  other  nationality  to  a  generous  and 
serene  personality. 

I  am  sometimes  disposed  to  think  that  Emer 
son's  "  English  Traits  "  reveal  his  American  traits 
more  than  anything  else  he  has  written.  We  are 
described  by  our  own  criticisms  of  others,  and 
especially  by  our  criticisms  of  another  nation; 
the  exceptions  we  take  are  the  mould  of  our  own 
figures.  So  we  have  valuable  glimpses  of  Emer 
son's  contours  throughout  this  volume.  And  it  is 
in  all  respects  a  fortunate  work ;  as  remarkable  a 
one  almost  for  him  to  write  as  a  volume  of  his  es 
says  for  any  one  else.  Comparatively  to  his  other 
books,  it  is  as  flesh  and  blood  to  spirit ;  Emerso 
nian  flesh  and  blood,  it  is  true,  and  semi-trans- 


EMEKSON  AS   AN  AMERICAN.  201 

lucent ;  but  still  it  completes  the  man  for  us :  he 
would  have  remained  too  problematical  without 
it.  Those  who  have  never  personally  known  him 
may  finish  and  solidify  their  impressions  of  him 
here.  He  likes  England  and  the  English,  too; 
and  that  sympathy  is  beyond  our  expectation  of 
the  mind  that  evolved  "  Nature  "  and  "  The  Over- 
Soul."  The  grasp  of  his  hand,  I  remember,  was 
firm  and  stout,  and  we  perceive  those  qualities  in 
the  descriptions  and  cordiality  of  "English 
Traits."  Then,  it  is  an  objective  book ;  the  eye 
looks  outward,  not  inward ;  these  pages  afford  a 
basis  not  elsewhere  obtainable  of  comparing  his 
general  human  faculty  with  that  of  other  men. 
Here  he  descends  from  the  airy  heights  he  treads 
so  easily  and,  standing  foot  to  foot  with  his  peers, 
measures  himself  against  them.  He  intends  only 
to  report  their  stature,  and  to  leave  himself  out  of 
the  story ;  but  their  answers  to  his  questions  show 
what  the  questions  were,  and  what  the  ques 
tioner.  And  we  cannot  help  suspecting,  though 
he  did  not,  that  the  Englishmen  were  not  a  little 
put  to  it  to  keep  pace  with  their  clear-faced, 
penetrating,  attentive  visitor. 

He  has  never  said  of  his  own  countrymen  the 
comfortable  things  that  he  tells  of  the  English; 


202  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

but  we  need  not  grumble  at  that.  The  father 
who  is  severe  with  his  own  children  will  freely 
admire  those  of  others,  for  whom  he  is  not  respon 
sible.  Emerson  is  stern  toward  what  we  are,  and 
arduous  indeed  in  his  estimate  of  what  we  ought 
to  be.  He  intimates  that  we  are  not  quite  worthy 
of  our  continent ;  that  we  have  not  as  yet  lived 
up  to  our  blue  china.  "  In  America  the  geogra 
phy  is  sublime,  but  the  men  are  not."  And  he 
adds  that  even  our  more  presentable  public  acts 
are  due  to  a  money-making  spirit :  "  The  bene^ 
faction  derived  in  Illinois  and  the  great  West 
from  railroads  is  inestimable,  and  vastly  exceed 
ing  any  intentional  philanthropy  on  record."  He 
does  not  think  very  respectfully  of  the  designs  or 
the  doings  of  the  people  who  went  to  California 
in  1849,  though  he  admits  that  "  California  gets 
civilized  in  this  immoral  way,"  and  is  fain  to  sup 
pose  that,  "  as  there  is  use  in  the  world  for  poi 
sons,  so  the  world  cannot  move  without  rogues," 
and  that,  in  respect  of  America,  "the  huge  ani 
mals  nourish  huge  parasites,  and  the  rancor  of  the 
disease  attests  the  strength  of  the  constitution." 
He  ridicules  our  unsuspecting  provincialism: 
"Have  you  seen  the  dozen  great  men  of  New 
York  and  Boston  ?  Then  you  may  as  well  die  !  " 


EMERSON   AS   AN   AMERICAN.  203 

He  does  not  spare  our  tendency  to  spread-eagle 
ism  and  declamation,  and  having  quoted  a  shrewd 
foreigner  as  saying  of  Americans  that,  "What 
ever  they  say  has  a  little  the  air  of  a  speech,"  he 
proceeds  to    speculate    whether    "the    American 
forest  has  refreshed  some  weeds  of  old    Pictish 
barbarism  just  ready  to  die  out  ?  "     He  finds  the 
foible  especially  of  American  youth  to  be  — pre 
tension  ;  and  remarks,  suggestively,  that  we  talk 
much  about  the  key  of  the  age,  but  "  the  key  to 
all  ages  is  imbecility ! "     He  cannot  reconcile  him 
self  to  the  mania  for  going  abroad.     "There  is 
a  restlessness  in  our  people  that  argues  want  of 
character.  .  .  .  Can  we  never  extract  this  tape 
worm  of  Europe  from  the  brain   of  our  country 
men?"     He     finds,    however,    this     involuntary 
compensation  in    the  practice — that,  practically 
"  we  go   to    Europe    to    be   Americanized,"   and 
has    faith    that   one    day   we  shall  cast  out  the 
passion  for  Europe   by   the    passion    for    Amer 
ica."      As     to     our     political     doings,    he     can 
never  regard  them  with  complacency.     "  Politics 
is  an  afterword,"  he  declares  —  "a  poor  patching. 
We  shall  one  day  learn  to  supersede  politics  by 
education."      He    sympathizes    with    Lovelace's 
theory  as  to  iron  bars  and  stone  walls,  and  holds 


204  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

that  freedom  and  slavery  are  inward,  not  out 
ward  conditions.  Slavery  is  not  in.  circumstance, 
but  in  feeling ;  you  cannot  eradicate  the  irons  by 
external  restrictions ;  and  the  truest  way  to  eman 
cipate  the  slave  would  be  to  educate  him  to  a 
comprehension  of  his  inviolable  dignity  and  free 
dom  as  a  human  being.  Amelioration  of  outward 
circumstances  will  be  the  effect,  but  can  never  be 
the  means  of  mental  and  moral  improvement. 
"Nothing  is  more  disgusting,"  he  affirms,  general 
izing  the  theme,  "  than  the  crowing  about  liberty 
by  slaves,  as  most  men  are,  and  the  flippant 
mistaking  for  freedom  of  some  paper  preamble 
like  a  4  Declaration  of  Independence '  or  the  stat 
ute  right  to  vote."  But,  "  Our  America  has  a 
bad  name  for  superficialness.  Great  men,  great 
nations,  have  not  been  boasters  and  buffoons,  but 
perceivers  of  the  terrors  of  life,  and  have  nerved 
themselves  to  face  it."  He  will  not  be  deceived 
by  the  clamor  of  blatant  reformers.  "  If  an  angry 
bigot  assumes  the  bountiful  cause  of  abolition, 
and  comes  to  me  with  his  last  news  from  Barba- 
does,  why  should  I  not  say  to  him  :  '  Go  love  thy 
infant ;  love  thy  wood-chopper ;  be  good-natured 
and  modest ;  have  that  grace,  and  never  varnish 
your  hard,  uncharitable  ambition  with  this  incred- 


EMERSON   AS   AN  AMERICAN.  205 

ible  tenderness  for  black  folk  a   thousand  miles 
off!'" 

He  does  not  shrink  from  questioning  the  valid 
ity  of  some  of  our  pet  institutions,  as,  for  in 
stance,  universal  suffrage.  He  reminds  us  that  in 
old  Egypt  the  vote  of  a  prophet  was  reckoned 
equal  to  one  hundred  hands,  and  records  his 
opinion  that  it  was  much  underestimated.  "Shall 
we,  then,"  he  asks,  "judge  a  country  by  the 
majority  or  by  the  minority  ?  By  the  minority, 
surely !  'Tis  pedantry  to  estimate  nations  by  the 
census,  or  by  square  miles  of  land,  or  other  than 
by  their  importance  to  the  mind  of  the  time." 
The  majority  are  unripe,  and  do  not  yet  know 
their  own  opinion.  He  would  not,  however, 
counsel  an  organic  alteration  in  this  respect,  be 
lieving  that,  with  the  progress  of  enlightenment, 
such  coarse  constructions  of  human  rights  will  ad 
just  themselves.  He  concedes  the  sagacity  of  the 
Fultons  and  Watts  of  politics,  who,  noticing  that 
the  opinion  of  the  million  was  the  terror  of  the 
world,  grouped  it  on  a  level,  instead  of  piling  it 
into  a  mountain,  and  so  contrived  to  make  of  this 
terror  the  most  harmless  and  energetic  form  of  a 
State.  But,  again,  he  would  not  have  us  regard 
the  State  as  a  finality,  or  as  relieving  any  man  of 


206  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

his  individual  responsibility  for  his  actions  and 
purposes.  We  are  to  confide  in  God  —  and  not 
in  our  money,  and  in  the  State  because  it  is  guard 
of  it.  The  Union  itself  has  no  basis  but  the  good 
pleasure  of  the  majority  to  be  united.  The  wise 
and  just  men  impart  strength  to  the  State,  not  re 
ceive  it;  and,  if  all  went  down,  they  and  their 
like  would  soon  combine  in  a  new  and  better 
constitution.  Yet  he  will  not  have  us  forget  that 
only  by  the  supernatural  is  a  man  strong ;  nothing 
so  weak  as  an  egotist.  We  are  mighty  only  as 
vehicles  of  a  truth  before  which  State  and  individ 
ual  are  alike  ephemeral.  In  this  sense  we,  like 
other  nations,  shall  have  our  kings  and  nobles  — 
the  leading  and  inspiration  of  the  best;  and  he 
who  would  become  a  member  of  that  nobility 
must  obey  his  heart. 

Government,  he  observes,  has  been  a  fossil  —  it 
should  be  a  plant ;  statute  law  should  express,  not 
impede,  the  mind  of  mankind.  In  tracing  the 
course  of  human  political  institutions,  he  finds 
feudalism  succeeding  monarchy,  and  this  again 
followed  by  trade,  the  good  and  evil  of  which  is 
that  it  would  put  everything  in  the  market, 
talent,  beauty,  virtue,  and  man  himself.  By  this 
means  it  has  done  its  work ;  it  has  faults  and  will 


'EMERSON  AS  AN  AMERICAN.  207 

end  as  the  others.  Its  aristocracy  need  not  be 
feared,  for  it  can  have  no  permanence,  it  is  not 
entailed.  In  the  time  to  come,  he  hopes  to  see  us 
less  anxious  to  be  governed,  in  the  technical 
sense ;  each  man  shall  govern  himself  in  the  in 
terests  of  all ;  government  without  any  governor 
will  be,  for  the  first  time,  adamantine.  Is  not 
every  man  sometimes  a  radical  in  politics  ?  Men 
are  conservatives  when  they  are  least  vigorous,  or 
when  they  are  most  luxurious ;  conservatism 
stands  on  man's  limitations,  reform  on  his  infini 
tude.  The  age  of  the  quadruped  is  to  go  out; 
the  age  of  the  brain  and  the  heart  is  to  come  in. 
We  are  too  pettifogging  and  imitative  in  our 
legislative  conceptions;  the  Legislature  of  this 
country  should  become  more  catholic  and  cosmo 
politan  than  any  other.  Let  us  be  brave  and 
strong  enough  to  trust  in  humanity;  strong 
natures  are  inevitable  patriots.  The  time,  the 
age,  what  is  that,  'but  a  few  prominent  persons 
and  a  few  active  persons  who  epitomize  the 
times?  There  is  a  bribe  possible  for  any  finite 
will ;  but  the  pure  sympathy  with  universal  ends 
is  an  infinite  force,  and  cannot  be  bribed  or  bent. 
The  world  wants  saviors  and  religions ;  society  is 
servile  from  want  of  will ;  but  there  is  a  Destiny 


208  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

by  which  the  human  race  is  guided,  the  race 
never  dying,  the  individual  never  spared ;  its  law 
is,  you  shall  have  everything  as  a  member,  noth 
ing  to  yourself.  Referring  to  the  communities  of 
various  kinds,  which  were  so  much  in  vogue  some 
years  ago,  he  holds  such  to  be  valuable,  not  for 
what  they  have  done,  but  for  the  indication  they 
give  of  the  revolution  that  is  on  the  way.  They 
place  great  faith  in  mutual  support,  but  it  is  only 
as  a  man  puts  off  from  himself  all  external  sup 
port  and  stands  alone,  that  he  is  strong  and  will 
prevail.  He  is  weaker  by  every  recruit  to  his 
banner.  A  man  ought  to  compare  advantageously 
with  a  river,  an  oak,  or  a  mountain.  He  must 
not  shun  whatever  comes  to  him  in  the  way  of 
duty ;  the  only  path  of  escape  is  —  performance. 
He  must  rely  on  Providence,  but  not  in  a  timid 
or  ecclesiastical  spirit ;  it  is  no  use  to  dress  up 
that  terrific  benefactor  in  a  clean  shirt  and  white 
neckcloth  of  a  student  of  divinity.  We  shall 
come  out  well,  whatever  personal  or  political 
disasters  may  intervene.  For  here  in  America  is 
the  home  of  man.  After  deducting  our  pitiful 
politics —  shall  John  or  Jonathan  sit  in  the  chair 
and  hold  the  purse  ?  —  and  making  due  allowance 
for  our  frivolities  and  insanities,  there  still  remains 


EMERSON  AS  AN  AMERICAN.  209 

an  organic  simplicity  and  liberty,  which,  when  it 
loses  its  balance,  redresses  itself  presently,  and 
which  offers  to  the  human  mind  opportunities  not 
known  elsewhere. 

Whenever  he  touches  upon  the  fundamental 
elements  of  social  and  rational  life,  it  is  always  to 
enlarge  and  illuminate  our  conception  of  them. 
We  are  not  wont  to  question  the  propriety  of  the 
sentiment  of  patriotism,  for  instance.  We  are  to 
swear  by  our  own  lares  and  penates,  and  stand 
up  for  the  American  eagle,  right  or  wrong.  But 
Emerson  instantly  goes  beneath  this  interpretation 
and  exposes  its  crudity.  The  true  sense  of  pa 
triotism,  according  to  him,  is  almost  the  reverse  of 
its  popular  sense.  He  has  no  sympathy  with  that 
boyish  egotism,  hoarse  with  cheering  for  our  side, 
for  our  State,  for  our  town ;  the  right  patriotism 
consists  in  the  delight  which  springs  from  contrib 
uting  our  peculiar  and  legitimate  advantages  to 
the  benefit  of  humanity.  Every  foot  of  soil  has 
its  proper  quality ;  the  grape  on  two  sides  of  the 
fence  has  new  flavors ;  and  so  every  acre  on  the 
globe,  every  family  of  men,  every  point  of 
climate,  has  its  distinguishing  virtues.  This  be 
ing  admitted,  however,  Emerson  will  yield  in 
patriotism  to  no  one ;  his  only  concern  is  that  the 


210  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

advantages  we  contribute  shall  be  the  most 
instead  of  the  least  possible.  "  This  country,"  he 
says,  "  does  not  lie  here  in  the  sun  causeless,  and 
though  it  may  not  be  easy  to  define  its  influence, 
men  feel  already  its  emancipating  quality  in  the 
careless  self-reliance  of  the  manners,  in  the  free 
dom  of  thought,  in  the  direct  roads  by  which 
grievances  are  reached  and  redressed,  and  even  in 
the  reckless  and  sinister  politics,  not  less  than  in 
purer  expressions.  Bad  as  it  is,  this  freedom 
leads  onward  and  upward  to  a  Columbia  of 
thought  and  art,  which  is  the  last  and  endless  end 
of  Columbus's  adventure."  Nor  is  this  poet  of 
virtue  and  philosophy  ever  more  truly  patriotic, 
from  his  spiritual  standpoint,  than  when  he 
throws  scorn  and  indignation  upon  his  country's 
sins  and  frailties.  "  But  who  is  he  that  prates  of 
the  culture  of  mankind,  of  better  arts  and  life  ? 
Go,  blind  worm,  go  —  behold  the  famous  States 
harrying  Mexico  with  rifle  and  with  knife  !  Or 
who,  with  accent  bolder,  dare  praise  the  freedom- 
loving  mountaineer  ?  I  found  by  thee,  O  rushing 
Contoocook  !  and  in  thy  valleys,  Agiochook !  the 
jackals  of  the  negro-holder.  .  .  .  What  boots  thy 
zeal,  O  glowing  friend,  that  would  indignant  rend 
the  northland  from  the  South  ?  Wherefore  ?  To 


EMEKSON  AS  AN  AMERICAN.  211 

what  good  end?  Boston  Bay  and  Bunker  Hill 
would  serve  things  still  — things  are  of  the  snake. 
The  horseman  serves  the  horse,  the  neat-herd 
serves  the  neat,  the  merchant  serves  the  purse, 
the  eater  serves  his  meat;  'tis  the  day  of  the 
chattel,  web  to  weave,  and  corn  to  grind ;  things 
are  in  the  saddle,  and  ride  mankind  !  " 

But  I  must  not  begin  to  quote  Emerson's 
poetry;  only  it  is  worth  noting  that  he,  whose 
verse  is  uniformly  so  abstractly  and  intellectually 
beautiful,  kindles  to  passion  whenever  his  theme 
is  of  America.  The  loftiest  patriotism  never 
found  more  ardent  and  eloquent  expression  than 
in  the  hymn  sung  at  the  completion  of  the  Con 
cord  monument,  on  the  19th  of  April,  1836. 
There  is  no  rancor  in  it;  no  taunt  of  triumph; 
"the  foe  long  since  in  silence  slept";  but  through 
out  there  resounds  a  note  of  pure  and  deep  re 
joicing  at  the  victory  of  justice  over  oppression, 
which  Concord  fight  so  aptly  symbolized.  In 
"Hamatreya"  and  "The  Earth  Song,"  another 
chord  is  struck,  of  calm,  laconic  irony.  Shall  we 
too,  he  asks,  we  Yankee  farmers,  descendants  of 
the  men  who  gave  up  all  for  freedom,  go  back  to 
the  creed  outworn  of  mediaeval  feudalism  and 
aristocracy,  and  say,  of  the  land  that  yields  us 


212  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

its  produce,  "Tis  mine,  my  children's,  and  my 
name's  "  ?  Earth  laughs  in  flowers  at  our  boyish 
boastfulness,  and  asks  "  How  am  I  theirs  if  they 
cannot  hold  me,  but  I  hold  them?"  "When  I 
heard  l  The  Earth  Song,'  I  was  no  longer  brave ; 
my  avarice  cooled,  like  lust  in  the  child  of  the 
grave."  Or  read  "Monadnoc,"  and  mark  the 
insight  and  the  power  with  which  the  significance 
and  worth  of  the  great  facts  of  nature  are  inter 
preted  and  stated.  "  Complement  of  human  kind, 
having  us  at  vantage  still,  our  sumptuous  indi 
gence,  oh,  barren  mound,  thy  plenties  fill!  We 
fool  and  prate;  thou  art  silent  and  sedate.  To 
myriad  kinds  and  times  one  sense  the  constant 
mountain  doth  dispense ;  shedding  on  all  its  snows 
and  leaves,  one  joy  it  joys,  one  grief  it  grieves. 
Thou  seest,  oh,  watchman  tall,  our  towns  and 
races  grow  and  fall,  and  imagest  the  stable  good 
for  which  we  all  our  lifetime  grope ;  and  though 
the  substance  us  elude,  we  in  thee  the  shadow 
find."  .  .  .  "Thou  dost  supply  the  shortness  of 
our  days,  and  promise,  on  thy  Founder's  truth, 
long  morrow  to  this  mortal  youth !  "  I  have  ig 
nored  the  versified  form  in  these  extracts,  in  order 
to  bring  them  into  more  direct  contrast  with  the 
writer's  prose,  and  show  that  the  poetry  is  inher- 


EMERSON  AS  AN  AMERICAN.  213 

ent.  No  other  poet,  with  whom  I  am  acquainted, 
has  caused  the  very  spirit  of  a  land,  the  mother  of 
men,  to  express  itself  so  adequately  as  Emerson 
has  done  in  these  pieces.  Whitman  falls  short  of 
them,  it  seems  to  me,  though  his  effort  is  greater. 

Emerson  is  continually  urging  us  to  give  heed 
to  this  grand  voice  of  hills  and  streams,  and  to 
mould  ourselves  upon  its  suggestions.  The  diffi 
culty  and  the  anomaly  are  that  we  are  not  native ; 
that  England  is  our  mother,  quite  as  much  as 
Monadnoc;  that  we  are  heirs  of  memories  and 
traditions  reaching  far  beyond  the  times  and  the 
confines  of  the  Republic.  We  cannot  assume  the 
splendid  childlikeness  of  the  great  primitive  races, 
and  exhibit  the  hairy  strength  and  unconscious 
genius  that  the  poet  longs  to  find  in  us.  He  re 
marks  somewhere  that  the  culminating  period  of 
good  in  nature  and  the  world  is  in  just  that  mo 
ment  of  transition,  when  the  swarthy  juices  still 
flow  plentifully  from  nature,  but  their  astringency 
or  acidity  is  got  out  by  ethics  and  humanity. 

It  was  at  such  a  period  that  Greece  attained  her 
apogee ;  but  our  experience,  it  seems  to  me,  must 
needs  be  different.  Our  story  is  not  of  birth,  but 
of  regeneration,  a  far  more  subtle  and  less  obvious 
transaction.  The  Homeric  California  of  which 


214  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

Bret  Harte  is  the  reporter  does  not  seem  to  me  In 
the  closest  sense  American.  It  is  a  comparatively 
superficial  matter  —  this  savage  freedom  and  raw 
poetry;  it  belongs  to  all  pioneering  life,  where 
every  man  must  stand  for  himself,  and  Judge 
Lynch  strings  up  the  defaulter  to  the  nearest  tree. 
But  we  are  only  incidentally  pioneers  in  this 
sense ;  and  the  characteristics  thus  impressed  upon 
us  will  leave  no  traces  in  the  completed  American. 
"  A  sturdy  lad  from  New  Hampshire  or  Vermont," 
says  Emerson,  "  who  in  turn  tries  all  the  profes 
sions —  who  teams  it,  farms  it,  peddles,  keeps  a 
school,  preaches,  edits  a  newspaper,  goes  to  Con 
gress,  buys  a  township,  and  so  forth,  in  successive 
years,  and  always,  like  a  cat,  falls  on  his  feet  —  is 
worth  a  hundred  of  these  city  dolls.  He  walks 
abreast  with  his  days,  and  feels  no  shame  in  not 
studying  a  '  profession,'  for  he  does  not  postpone 
his  life,  but  lives  already."  That  is  stirringly 
said :  but,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  most  of  the  Ameri 
cans  whom  we  recognize  as  great  did  not  have 
such  a  history ;  nor,  if  they  had  it,  would  they  be 
on  that  account  more  American.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  careers  of  men  like  Jim  Fiske  and  Com 
modore  Vanderbilt  might  serve  very  well  as  illus 
trations  of  the  above  sketch.  If  we  must  wait  for 


EMERSON  AS  AN  AMERICAN.  215 

our  character  until  our  geographical  advantages 
and  the  absence  of  social  distinctions  manufacture 
it  for  us,  we  are  likely  to  remain  a  long  while  in 
suspense.  When  our  foreign  visitors  begin  to 
evince  a  more  poignant  interest  in  Concord  and 
Fifth  Avenue  than  in  the  Mississippi  and  the  Yel 
lowstone,  it  may  be  an  indication  to  us  that  we 
are  assuming  our  proper  position  relative  to  our 
physical  environment,  " The  land"  says  Emerson, 
"  is  a  sanative  and  Americanizing  influence  which 
promises  to  disclose  new  virtues  for  ages  to  come." 
Well,  when  we  are  virtuous,  we  may,  perhaps, 
spare  our  own  blushes  by  allowing  our  topogra 
phy,  symbolically,  to  celebrate  us,  and  when  our 
admirers  would  worship  the  purity  of  our  inten 
tions,  refer  them  to  Walden  Pond ;  or  to  Mount 
Shasta,  when  they  would  expatiate  upon  our  lofty 
generosity.  It  is,  perhaps,  true,  meanwhile,  that 
the  chances  of  a  man's  leading  a  decent  life  are 
greater  in  a  palace  than  in  a  pigsty. 

But  this  is  holding  our  author  too  strictly  to 
the  letter  of  his  message.  And,  at  any  rate,  the 
Americanism  of  Emerson  is  better  than  anything 
that  he  has  said  in  vindication  of  it.  He  is  the 
champion  of  this  commonwealth ;  he  is  our  future, 
living  in  our  present,  and  showing  the  world,  by 


216  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

anticipation,  as  it  were,  what  sort  of  excellence 
we  are  capable  of  attaining.  A  nation  that  has 
produced  Emerson,  and  can  recognize  in  him  bone 
of  her  bone  and  flesh  of  her  flesh  —  and,  still  more, 
spirit  of  her  spirit  —  that  nation  may  look  toward 
the  coming  age  with  security.  But  he  has  done 
more  than  thus  to  prophesy  of  his  country ;  he  is 
electric  and  stimulates  us  to  fulfil  our  destiny. 
To  use  a  phrase  of  his  own,  we  "cannot  hear  of 
personal  vigor  of  any  kind,  great  power  of  per 
formance,  without  fresh  resolution."  Emerson 
helps  us  most  in  provoking  us  to  help  ourselves. 
The  pleasantest  revenge  is  that  which  we  can 
sometimes  take  upon  our  great  men  in  quoting  of 
themselves  what  they  have  said  of  others. 

It  is  easy  to  be  so  revenged  upon  Emerson,  be 
cause  he,  more  than  most  persons  of  such  eminence, 
has  been  generous  and  cordial  in  his  appreciation 
of  all  human  worth.  "If  there  should  appear  in 
the  company,"  he  observes,  "some  gentle  soul  who 
knows  little  of  persons  and  parties,  of  Carolina  or 
Cuba,  but  who  announces  a  law  that  disposes  these 
particulars,  and  so  certifies  me  of  the  equity  which 
checkmates  every  false  player,  bankrupts  every 
self-seeker,  and  apprises  me  of  my  independence 
on  any  conditions  of  country,  or  time,  or  human 


EMERSON  AS  AN  AMERICAN.  217 

body,  that  man  liberates  me.  ...  I  am  made 
immortal  by  apprehending  my  possession  of  incor 
ruptible  goods."  Who  can  state  the  mission  and 
effect  of  Emerson  more  tersely  and  aptly  than 
those  words  do  it? 

But,  once  more,  he  does  not  desire  eulogiums, 
and  it  seems  half  ungenerous  to  force  them  upon 
him  now  that  he  can  no  longer  defend  himself.  I 
prefer  to  conclude  by  repeating  a  passage  charac 
teristic  of  him  both  as  a  man  and  as  an  American, 
and  which,  perhaps,  conveys  a  sounder  and  health 
ier  criticism,  both  for  us  and  for  him,  than  any 
mere  abject  and  nerveless  admiration;  for  great 
men  are  great  only  in  so  far  as  they  liberate  us, 
and  we  undo  their  work  in  courting  their  tyranny. 
The  passage  runs  thus :  — 

"Let  me  remind  the  reader  that  I  am  only  an 
experimenter.  Do  not  set  the  least  value  on  what 
I  do,  or  the  least  discredit  on  what  I  do  not,  as  if 
I  pretended  to  settle  anything  as  true  or  false.  I 
unsettle  all  things.  No  facts  to  me  are  sacred; 
none  are  profane.  I  simply  experiment — an  end 
less  seeker,  with  no  Past  at  my  back !  " 


CHAPTER  X. 

MODERN   MAGIC. 

HUMAN  nature  enjoys  nothing  better  than  to 
wonder  —  to  be  mystified ;  and  it  thanks  and  re 
members  those  who  have  the  skill  to  gratify 
this  craving.  The  magicians  of  old  knew  that 
truth  and  conducted  themselves  accordingly. 
But  our  modern  wonder-workers  fail  of  their  due 
influence,  because,  not  content  to  perform  their 
marvels,  they  go  on  to  explain  them.  Merlin  and 
Roger  Bacon  were  greater  public  benefactors 
than  Morse  and  Edison.  Man  is  —  and  he  always 
has  been  and  will  be  —  something  else  besides  a 
pure  intelligence :  and  science,  in  order  to  become 
really  popular,  must  contrive  to  touch  man  some 
where  else  besides  on  the  purely  intellectual  side : 
it  must  remember  that  man  is  all  heart,  all  hope, 
all  fear,  and  all  foolishness,  quite  as  much  as  he  is 
all  brains.  Otherwise,  science  can  never  expect 
to  take  the  place  of  superstition,  much  less  of  re 
ligion,  in  mankind's  affection.  In  order  to  be  a 
218 


MODERN  MAGIC.  219 

really  successful  man  of  science,  it  is  first  of  all 
indispensable  to  make  one's  self  master  of  every 
thing  in  nature  and  in  human  nature  that  science 
is  not. 

What  must  one  do,  in  short,  in  order  to  become 
a  magician  ?  I  use  the  term,  here,  in  its  weight 
iest  sense.  How  to  make  myself  visible  and  in 
visible  at  will  ?  How  to  present  myself  in  two  or 
more  places  at  once  ?  How  answer  your  question 
before  you  ask  it,  and  describe  to  you  your  most 
secret  thoughts  and  actions?  How  shall  I  call 
spirits  from  the  vasty  deep,  and  make  you  see 
and  hear  and  feel  them?  How  paralyze  your 
strength  with  a  look,  heal  your  wound  with  a 
touch,  or  cause  your  bullet  to  rebound  harmless 
from  my  unprotected  flesh  ?  How  shall  I  walk  on 
the  air,  sink  through  the  earth,  pass  through  stone 
walls,  or  walk,  dry-shod,  on  the  floor  of  the  ocean  ? 
How  shall  I  visit  the  other  side  of  the  moon,  jump 
through  the  ring  of  Saturn,  and  gather  sunflowers 
in  Sirius?  There  are  persons  now  living  who 
profess  to  do  no  less  remarkable  feats,  and  to  re 
gard  them  as  incidental  merely  to  achievements 
far  more  important.  A  school  of  hierophants  or 
adepts  is  said  to  exist  in  Tibet,  who,  as  a  matter 
of  daily  routine,  quite  transcend  everything  that 


220  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

we  have  been  accustomed  to  consider  natural 
possibility.  What  is  the  course  of  study,  what 
are  the  ways  and  means  whereby  such  persons 
accomplish  such  results  ? 

The  conventional  attitude  towards  such  matters 
is,  of  course,  that  of  unconditional  scepticism. 
But  it  is  pleasant,  occasionally,  to  take  an  airing 
^X  beyond  the  bounds  of  incredulity.  For  my  own 
part,  it  is  true,  I  must  confess  my  inability  to 
believe  in  anything  positively  supernatural.  The 
supernatural  and  the  illusory  are  to  my  mind  con 
vertible  terms :  they  cannot  really  exist  or  take 
place.  Let  us  be  sure,  however,  that  we  are 
agreed  as  to  what  supernatural  means.  If  a  ma 
gician,  before  my  eyes,  transformed  an  old  man 
into  a  little  girl,  I  should  call  that  supernatural ; 
and  nothing  should  convince  me  that  my  senses 
had  not  been  grossly  deceived.  But  were  the  ma 
gician  to  leave  the  room  by  passing  through  the 
solid  wall,  or  "go  out"  like  an  exploding  soap- 
bubble, —  I  might  think  what  I  please,  but  I 
should  not  venture  to  dogmatically  pronounce 
the  thing  supernatural  ;_beucswise  the  phenomenon 
known  as  "  matter  "  is  scientifically  unknown,  and 
therefore  no  one  can  tell  what  modifications  it 
may  not  be  susceptible  of: — no  one,  that  is  to 


MODERN  MAGIC.  221 

say,  except  the  person  who,  like  the  magician  of 
our  illustration,  professes  to  possess,  and  (for  aught 
I  can  affirm  to  the  contrary)  may  actually  possess 
a  knowledge  unshared  by  the  bulk  of  mankind. 
The  transformation  of  an  old  man  into  a  little 
girl,  on  the  other  hand,  would  be  a  transaction 
involving  the  immaterial  soul  as  well  as  the  ma 
terial  body ;  and  if  I  do  not  know  that  that  can 
not  take  place,  I  am  forever  incapable  of  knowing 
anything.  These  are  extreme  examples,  but  they 
serve  to  emphasize  an  important  distinction. 

The  whole  domain  of  magic,  in  short,  occupies 
that  anomalous  neutral  ground  that  intervenes 
between  the  facts  of  our  senses  and  the  truths  of 
our  intuitions.  Fact  and  truth  are  not  convert 
ible  terms ;  they  abide  in  two  distinct  planes,  like 
thought  and  speech,  or  soul  and  body ;  one  may 
imply  or  involve  the  other,  but  can  never  demon 
strate  it.  Experience  and  intuition  together  com 
prehend  the  entire  realm  of  actual  and  con 
ceivable  knowledge.  Whatever  contradicts  both 
experience  and  intuition  may,  therefore,  be  pro 
nounced  illusion.  But  this  neutral  ground  is  the 
home  of  phenomena  which  intuition  does  not 
deny,  and  which  experience  has  not  confirmed. 
It  is  still  a  wide  zone,  though  not  so  wide  as  it 


222  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

was  a  hundred  years  ago,  or  fifty,  or  even  ten.  It 
narrows  every  day,  as  science,  or  the  classification 
of  experience,  expands.  Are  we,  then,  to  look 
for  a  time  when  the  zone  shall  have  dwindled  to 
a  mathematical  line,  and  magic  confess  itself  to 
have  been  nothing  but  the  science  of  an  advanced 
school  of  investigators?  Will  the  human  intel 
lect  acquire  a  power  before  which  all  mysteries 
shall  become  transparent?  Let  us  dwell  upon 
this  question  a  little  longer. 

A  mystery  that  is  a  mystery  can  never,  hu 
manly  speaking,  become  anything  else.  Instances 
of  such  mysteries  can  readily  be  adduced.  The 
universe  itself  is  built  upon  them  and  is  the 
greatest  of  them.  They  lie  before  the  threshold 
and  at  the  basis  of  all  existence.  For  example  : — 
here  is  a  lump  of  compact,  whitish,  cheese-like  sub 
stance,  about  as  much  as  would  go  into  a  thimble. 
From  this  I  profess  to  be  able  to  produce  a 
gigantic,  intricate  structure,  sixty  feet  in  height 
and  diameter,  hard,  solid,  and  enduring,  which 
shall  furthermore  possess  the  power  of  extending 
and  multiplying  itself  until  it  covers  the  whole 
earth,  and  even  all  the  earths  in  the  universe,  if 
it  could  reach  them.  Is  such  a  profession  as  this 
credible?  It  is  entirely  credible,  as  soon  as  I 


MODERN  MAGIC.  223 

paraphrase  it  by  saying  that  I  propose  to  plant  an 
acorn.  And  yet  all  magic  has  no  mystery  which 
is  so  wonderful  as  this  universal  mystery  of 
growth :  and  the  only  reason  we  are  not  lost  in 
amazement  at  it  is  that  it  goes  quietly  on  all  the 
time,  and  perfects  itself  under  uniform  conditions. 
But  let  me  eliminate  from  the  phenomenon  the 
one  element  of  time  —  which  is  logically  the  least 
essential  factor  in  the  product,  unreal  and  arbi 
trary,  based  on  the  revolution  of  the  earth,  and 
conceivably  variable  to  any  extent  —  grant  me 
this,  and  the  world  would  come  to  see  me  do  the 
miracle.  But,  with  time  or  without  it,  the  mys 
tery  is  just  as  mysterious. 

Natural  mysteries,  then, — the  mysteries  of  life, 
death,  creation,  growth,  —  do  not  fall  under  our 
present  consideration :  they  are  beyond  the  legiti 
mate  domain  of  magic:  and  no  intellectual  devel 
opment  to  which  we  may  hereafter  attain  will 
bring  us  a  step  nearer  their  solution.  But  with  the 
problems  proper  to  magic,  the  case  is  different. 
Magic  is  distinctively  not  Divine,  but  human :  a 
finite  conundrum,  not  an  Infinite  enigma.  If 
there  has  ever  been  a  magician  since  the  world 
began,  then  all  mankind  may  become  magicians, 
if  they  will  give  the  necessary  time  and  trouble. 


224  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

And  yet,  magic  is  not  simply  an  advanced  region 
of  the  path  which  science  is  pursuing.  Science  is 
concerned  with  results,  —  with  material  phenom 
ena;  whereas  magic  is,  primarily,  the  study  of 
causes,  or  of  spiritual  phenomena;  or,  to  use 
another  definition,  —  of  phenomena  which  the 
senses  perceive,  not  in  themselves,  but  only  in 
their  results.  So  long  as  we  restrict  ourselves  to 
results,  our  activity  is  confined  to  analysis ;  but 
when  we  begin  to  investigate  causes,  we  are  on 
the  road  not  only  to  comprehend  results,  but 
(within  limits)  to  modify  or  produce  them. 

Science,  however,  blocks  our  advance  in  this 
direction  by  denying,  or  at  least  refusing  to  admit, 
the  existence  of  the  spiritual  world,  or  world  of 
causes :  because,  being  spiritual,  it  is  not  sensible, 
or  cognizable  in  sense.  Science  admits  only  ma 
terial  causes,  or  the  changes  wrought  in  matter  by 
itself.  If  we  ask  what  is  the  cause  of  a  material 
cause,  we  are  answered  that  it  is  a  supposed  entity 
called  Force,  concerning  which  there  is  nothing 
further  to  be  known. 

At  this  point,  then,  argument  (on  the  material 
plane)  comes  to  an  end,  and  speculation  or  as 
sumption  begins.  Science  answers  its  own  ques 
tions,  but  neither  can  nor  will  answer  any  others. 


MODERN  MAGIC.  225 

And  upon  what  pretence  do  we  ask  any  others  ? 
We  ask  them  upon  two  grounds.      The  first  is 
that   some   people,  —  we    might    even   say,    most 
people, — would  be  glad  to  believe  in  supersen- 
suous  existence,  and  are  always  on  the  alert  to 
examine    any   plausible    hypothesis    pointing    in 
that  direction:    and  secondly,  there  exists  a  vast 
amount  of  testimony   (we  need  not  call  it  evi 
dence)  tending  to  show  that  the  supersensuous 
world  has  been  discovered,  and  that  it  endows  its 
discoverers  with  sundry  notable  advantages.     Of 
course,  we  are  not  obliged  to  credit   this  testi 
mony,  unless  we  want  to  :  and  —  for  some  reason, 
never  fully  explained  —  a  great  many  people  who 
accept  natural   mysteries   quite   amiably  become 
indignant  when  requested  to  examine  mysteries 
of  a  much  milder  order.     But  it  is  not  my  inten 
tion  to  discuss  the  limits  of  the  probable ;  but  to 
swallow  as  much  as  possible  first,  and  endeavor  to 
account  for  it  afterwards. 

There  is,  as  every  reader  knows,  a  class  of  phe 
nomena —  such  as  hypnotism,  trance,  animal  mag 
netism,  and  so  forth  —  the  occurrence  of  which 
science  has  conceded,  though  failing  as  yet  to 
.offer  any  intelligent  explanation  of  them.  It  is 
suggested  that  they  are  peculiar  states  of  the 


226  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

brain  and  nerve-centres,  physical  in  their  nature 
and  origin,  though  evading  our  present  physical 
tests.  Be  that  as  it  may,  they  afford  a  capital  in 
troduction  to  the  study  of  magic ;  if,  indeed,  they, 
and  a  few  allied  phenomena,  do  not  comprise  the 
germs  of  the  whole  matter.  Apropos  of  this 
subject,  a  society  has  lately  been  organized  in 
London,  with  branches  on  the  Continent  and  in 
this  country,  composed  of  scientific  men,  Fellows 
of  the  Royal  Society,  members  of  Parliament,  pro 
fessors,  and  literary  men,  calling  themselves  the 
"  Psychical  Research  Society,"  and  making  it  their 
business  to  test  and  investigate  these  very  mar 
vels,  under  the  most  stringent  scientific  condi 
tions.  But  the  capacity  to  be  deceived  of  the 
bodily  senses  is  almost  unlimited;  in  fact,  we 
know  that  they  are  incapable  of  telling  us  the 
ultimate  truth  on  any  subject ;  and  we  are  able  to 
get  along  with  them  only  because  we  have  found 
their  misinformation  to  be  sufficiently  uniform 
for  most  practical  purposes.  But  once  admit  that 
the  origin  of  these  phenomena  is  not  on  the 
physical  plane,  and  then,  if  we  are  to  give  any 
weight  at  all  to  them,  it  can  be  only  from  a  spirit 
ual  standpoint.  In  other  words,  unless  we  can 
approach  such  questions  by  an  a  priori  route,  we 


MODERN  MAGIC.  227 

might  as  well  let  them  alone.  We  can  reason 
from  spirit  to  body  —  from  mind  to  matter  —  but 
we  can  never  reverse  that  process,  and  from  mat. 
ter  evolve  mind.  The  reason  is  that  matter  is 
not  found  to  contain  mind,  but  is  only  acted 
upon  by  it,  as  inferior  by  superior ;  and  we  can 
not  get  out  of  the  bag  more  than  has  been  put 
into  it.  The  acorn  (to  use  our  former  figure)  can 
never  explain  the  oak ;  but  the  oak  readily  ac 
counts  for  the  acorn.  It  may  be  doubted,  there 
fore,  whether  the  Psychical  Research  Society  can 
succeed  in  doing  more  than  to  give  a  respectable 
endorsement  to  a  perplexing  possibility,  —  so  long 
as  they  adhere  to  the  inductive  method.  Should 
they,  however,  abandon  the  inductive  method  for 
the  deductive,  they  will  forfeit  the  allegiance  of 
all  consistently  scientific  minds ;  and  they  may, 
perhaps,  make  some  curious  contributions  to  phil 
osophy.  At  present,  they  appear  to  be  astride 
the  fence  between  philosophy  and  science,  as  if 
they  hoped  in  some  way  to  make  the  former  sat 
isfy  the  latter's  demands.  But  the  difference  be 
tween  the  evidence  that  demonstrates  a  fact  and 
the  evidence  that  confirms  a  truth  is,  once  more,  a 
difference  less  of  degree  than  of  kind.  We  can 
never  obtain  sensible  verification  of  a  proposition 


228  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

that  transcends  sense.  We  must  accept  it  without 
material  proof,  or  not  at  all.  We  may  believe,  for 
instance,  that  Creation  is  the  work  of  an  intel 
ligent  Divine  Being;  or  we  may  disbelieve  it ; 
but  we  can  never  prove  it.  If  we  do  believe  it, 
innumerable  confirmations  of  it  meet  us  at  every 
turn :  but  no  such  confirmations,  and  no  multipli 
cation  of  them,  can  persuade  a  disbeliever.  For 
belief  is  ever  incommunicable  from  without ;  it 
can  be  generated  only  from  within.  The  term 
"  belief  "  cannot  be  applied  to  our  recognition  of 
a  physical  fact :  we  do  not  believe  in  that  —  we 
are  only  sensible  of  it. 

In  this  connection,  a  few  words  will  be  in  order 
concerning  what  is  called  Spiritism,  —  a  subject 
which  has  of  late  years  been  exciting  a  good  deal 
of  remark.  Its  disciples  claim  for  it  the  dignity  of 
a  new  and  positive  revelation,  —  a  revelation  to 
sense  of  spiritual  being.  Now,  the  entire  universe 
may  be  described  as  a  revelation  to  sense  of  spirit 
ual  being  —  for  those  who  happen  to  believe  a 
priori,  or  from  spontaneous  inward  conviction,  in 
spiritual  being.  We  may  believe  a  man's  body, 
for  example,  to  be  the  effect  of  which  his  soul  is 
the  cause  ;  but  no  one  can  reach  that  conviction 
by  the  most  refined  dissection  of  the  bodily  tis- 


MODERN  MAGIC.  229 

sues.  How,  then,  does  the  spiritists'  Positive 
Revelation  help  the  matter?  Their  answer  is 
that  the  physical  universe  is  a  permanent  and 
orderly  phenomenon  which  (setting  aside  the 
problem  of  its  First  Cause)  fully  accounts  for 
itself;  whereas  the  phenomena  of  Spiritism,  such 
as  rapping,  table-tipping,  materializing,  and  so 
forth,  are,  if  not  supernatural,  at  any  rate  extra- 
natural.  They  occur  in  consequence  of  a  con 
scious  effort  to  bring  them  about;  they  cease 
when  that  effort  is  discontinued ;  they  abound  in 
indications  of  being  produced  by  independent  in- 
telligencies ;  they  are  inexplicable  upon  any  recog 
nized  theory  of  physics;  and,  therefore,  there  is 
nothing  for  it  but  to  regard  them  as  spiritual. 
And  what  then  ?  Then,  of  course,  there  must  be 
spirits,  and  a  life  after  the  death  of  the  body; 
and  the  great  question  of  Immortality  is  answered 
in  the  affirmative ! 

Let  us,  for  the  sake  of  argument,  concede  that 
the  manifestations  upon  which  the  Spiritists 
found  their  claims  are  genuine :  that  they  are  or 
can  be  produced  without  fraud ;  and  let  us  then 
enquire  in  what  respect  our  means  for  the  conver 
sion  of  the  sceptic  are  improved.  In  the  first 
place  we  find  that  all  the  manifestations — be  their 


230  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

cause  what  it  may  —  can  occur  only  on  the  physi 
cal  plane.  However  much  the  origin  of  the 
phenomena  may  perplex  us,  the  phenomena 
themselves  must  be  purely  material,  in  so  far  as 
they  are  perceptible  at  all.  "Raps"  are  audible 
according  to  the  same  laws  of  vibration  as  other 
sounds :  the  tilting  table  is  simply  a  material  body 
displaced  by  an  adequate  agency;  the  materialized 
hand  or  face  is  nothing  but  physical  substance 
assuming  form.  Plainly,  therefore,  we  have  as 
much  right  to  ascribe  a  spiritual  source  to  such 
phenomena  as  we  have  to  ascribe  a  spiritual 
source  to  the  ordinary  phenomena  of  nature,  such 
as  a  tree  or  a  man's  body, —  just  as  much  right  — 
and  no  more  !  Consequently,  we  are  no  nearer 
converting  our  sceptic  than  we  were  at  the  out 
set.  He  admits  the  physical  manifestation :  there 
is  no  intrinsic  novelty  about  that :  but  when  we 
proceed  to  argue  that  the  manifestations  are 
wrought  by  spirits,  he  points  out  to  us  that  this  is 
sheer  assumption  on  our  part.  "  I  have  not  seen 
a  spirit,"  he  says :  "  I  have  not  heard  one  ;  I  have 
not  felt  one ;  nor  is  it  possible  that  my  bodily 
senses  should  perceive  anything  that  is  not  at 
least  as  physical  as  they  are.  I  have  witnessed 
certain  transactions  effected  by  means  unknown 


\ 
MODERN  MAGIC.  231 


to  me — possibly  by  the  action  of  a  natural  law  not 
yet  fully  expounded  by  science.  If  there  was  any 
thing  spiritual  in  the  affair,  it  has  not  been  mani 
fest  to  my  apprehension :  and  I  must  decline  to 
lend  my  countenance  to  any  such  pretensions." 

That  would  be  the  reply  of  the  sceptic  who  was 
equal  to  the  emergency.  But  let  us  suppose  that 
he  is  not  equal  to  it :  that  he  is  a  weak-kneed, 
impressionable  person,  with  a  tendency  to  jump 
at  conclusions  ;  and  that  he  is  scared  or  mystified 
into  believing  that  "  spirits  "  may  be  at  the  bot 
tom  of  it.  What,  then,  will  be  the  character  of 
the  faith  which  the  Positive  Revelation  has 
furnished  him  ?  He  has  discovered  that  existence 
continues,  in  some  fashion,  after  the  death  of  the 
body.  He  has  learned  that  there  may  be  such  a 
thing  as  —  not  immortality  exactly,  but  —  post 
mortem  consciousness.  He  has  been  saddled  with 
the  conviction  that  the  other  world  is  full  of  rest 
less  ghosts,  who  come  shuddering  back  from  their 
cold  emptiness,  and  try  to  warm  themselves  in  the 
borrowed  flesh  and  blood,  and  with  the  purblind 
selfishness  and  curiosity  of  us  who  still  remain 
here.  "  Have  faith :  be  not  impatient :  the  con 
ditions  are  unfavorable  :  but  we  are  working  for 
you!  "  —  such  is  the  constant  burden  of  the  com- 


232  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

munications.  But,  if  there  be  a  God,  why  must 
our  relations  with  him  be  complicated  by  the  in 
terference  of  such  forlorn  prevaricators  and 
amateur  Paracletes  as  these  ?  we  do  not  wish  to 
be  "  worked  for,"  —  to  be  carried  heavenward  on 
some  one  else's  shoulders:  but  to  climb  thither 
by  God's  help  and  our  own  will,  or  to  stay  were 
we  are.  Moreover,  by  what  touchstone  shall  we 
test  the  veracity  of  the  self-appointed  purveyors  of 
this  Positive  Revelation  ?  Are  we  to  believe  what 
they  say,  because  they  have  lost  their  bodies?  If 
life  teaches  us  anything,  it  is  that  God  does  above 
all  things  respect  the  spiritual  freedom  of  his 
creatures.  He  does  not  terrify  and  bully  us  into 
acknowledging  Him  by  ghostly  juggleries  in 
darkened  rooms,  and  by  vapid  exhibitions  ad 
dressed  to  our  outward  senses.  He  approaches 
each  man  in  the  innermost  sacred  audience-cham 
ber  of  his  heart,  and  there  shows  him  good  and 
evil,  truth  and  falsehood,  and  bids  him  choose. 
And  that  choice,  if  made  aright,  becomes  a  genu 
ine  and  undying  belief,  because  it  was  made  in 
freedom,  unbiassed  by  external  threats  and  cajo 
leries.  Such  belief  is,  itself,  immortality,-—  some 
thing  as  distinct  from  post-mortem  consciousness 
as  wisdom  is  distinct  from  mere  animal  intelli- 


MODERN  MAGIC.  233 

gence.  On  the  whole,  therefore,  there  seerns  to 
belittle  real  worth  in  Spiritism,  even  accepting  it 
at  its  own  valuation.  The  nourishment  it  yields 
the  soul  is  too  meagre ;  and  —  save  on  that  one 
bare  point  of  life  beyond  the  grave,  which  might 
just  as  easily  prove  an  infinite  curse  as  an  infinite 
blessing — it  affords  no  trustworthy  news  whatever. 

But  these  objections  do  not  apply  to  magic 
proper.  Magic  seems  to  consist  mainly  in  the 
control  which  mind  may  exceptionally  exercise 
over  matter.  In  hypnotism,  the  subject  abjectly 
believes  and  obeys  the  operator.  If  he  be  told 
that  he  cannot  step  across  a  chalk  mark  on  the 
floor,  he  cannot  step  across  it.  He  dissolves  in 
tears  or  explodes  with  laughter,  according  as  the 
operator  tells  him  he  has  cause  for  merriment  or 
tears:  and  if  he  be  assured  that  the  water  he 
drinks  is  Madeira  wine  or  Java  coffee,  he  has  no 
misgiving  that  such  is  not  the  case. 

To  say  that  this  state  of  things  is  brought 
about  by  the  exercise  of  the  operator's  will,  is  not 
to  explain  the  phenomenon,  but  to  put  it  in  dif 
ferent  terms.  What  is  the  will,  and  how  does  it 
produce  such  a  result  ?  Here  is  a  man  who  be 
lieves,  at  the  word  of  command,  that  the  thing 
which  all  the  rest  of  the  world  calls  a  chair  is  a 


234  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

horse.  How  is  such  misapprehension  on  his  part 
possible  ?  our  senses  are  our  sole  means  of  know 
ing  external  objects :  and  this  man's  senses  seem 
to  confirm  —  at  least  they  by  no  means  correct  — 
his  persuasion  that  a  given  object  is  something 
very  different.  Could  we  solve  this  puzzle,  we 
should  have  done  something  towards  gaining  an 
insight  into  the  philosophy  of  magic. 

We  observe,  in  the  first  place,  that  the  rationale 
of  hypnotism,  and  of  trance  in  general,  is  distinct 
from  that  of  memory  and  of  imagination,  and 
even  from  that  of  dreams.  It  resembles  these 
only  in  so  far  as  it  involves  a  quasi-perception  of 
something  not  actually  present  or  existent.  But 
memory  and  imagination  never  mislead  us  into 
mistaking  their  suggestions  for  realities :  while  in 
dreams,  the  dreamer's  fancy  alone  is  active;  the 
bodily  faculties  are  not  in  action.  In  trance, 
however,  the  subject  may  appear  to  be,  to  all 
intents  and  purposes,  awake.  Yet  this  state,  un 
like  the  others,  is  abnormal.  The  brain  seems  to 
be  in  a  passive,  or,  at  any  rate,  in  a  detached  con 
dition  ;  it  cannot  carry  out  or  originate  ideas,  nor 
can  it  examine  an  idea  as  to  its  truth  or  falsehood. 
Furthermore,  it  cannot  receive  or  interpret  the 
reports  of  its  own  bodily  senses.  In  short,  its 


MODERN  MAGIC.  235 

relations  with  the  external  world  are  suspended  : 
and  since  the  body  is  a  part  of  the  external 
world,  the  brain  can  no  longer  control  the  body's 
movements. 

Bodily  movements  are,  however,  to  some  extent, 
automatic.  Given  a  certain  stimulus  in  the  brain 
or  nerve-centres,  and  certain  corresponding  mus 
cular  contractions  follow:  and  this  whether  or 
not  the  stimulus  be  applied  in  a  normal  manner. 
Although,  therefore,  the  entranced  brain  cannot 
spontaneously  control  the  body,  yet  if  we  can 
apply  an  independent  stimulus  to  it,  the  body  will 
make  a  fitting  and  apparently  intelligent  response. 
The  reader  has  doubtless  seen  those  ingenious 
pieces  of  mechanism  which  are  set  in  motion  by 
dropping  into  an  orifice  a  coin  or  pellet.  Now, 
could  we  drop  into  the  passive  brain  of  an  en 
tranced  person  the  idea  that  a  chair  is  a  horse,  for 
instance, —  the  person  would  give  every  sensible 
indication  of  having  adopted  that  figment  as  a 
fact. 

But  how  (since  he  can  no  longer  communicate 
with  the  world  by  means  of  his  senses)  is  this  idea 
to  be  insinuated  ?  The  man  is  magnetized  —  that 
is  to  say,  insulated ;  how  can  we  have  intercourse 
with  him  ? 


236  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

Experiments  show  that  this  can  be  effected  only 
through  the  magnetizer.  Asleep  towards  the  rest 
of  the  world,  towards  him  the  entranced  person  is 
awake.  Not  awake,  however,  as  to  the  bodily 
senses ;  neither  the  magnetizer  nor  any  one  else 
can  approach  by  that  route.  It  is  true  that, 
if  the  magnetizer  speaks  to  him,  he  knows  what  is 
said:  but  he  does  not  hear  physically;  because 
he  perceives  the  unspoken  thought  just  as  readily. 
But  since  whatever  does  not  belong  to  his  body 
must  belong  to  his  soul  (or  mind,  if  that  term  be 
preferable),  it  follows  that  the  magnetizer  must 
communicate  with  the  magnetized  on  the  mental 
or  spiritual  plane ;  that  is,  immediately,  or  with 
out  the  intervention  of  the  body. 

Let  us  review  the  position  we  have  reached  :  — 
We  have  an  entranced  or  magnetized  person,  —  a 
person  whose  mind,  or  spirit,  has,  by  a  certain 
process,  been  so  far  withdrawn  from  conscious 
communion  with  his  own  bodily  senses  as  to  dis 
able  him  from  receiving  through  them  any  tidings 
from  the  external  world.  He  is  not,  however, 
wholly  withdrawn  from  his  body,  for,  in  that  case, 
the  body  would  be  dead;  whereas,  in  fact,  its 
organic  or  animal  life  continues  almost  unim 
paired.  He  is  therefore  neither  out  of  the  body 


MODERN   MAGIC.  237 

nor  in  it,  but  in  an  anomalous  region  midway 
between  the  two, —  a  state  in  which  he  can  receive 
no  sensuous  impressions  from  the  physical  world, 
nor  be  put  in  conscious  communication  with  the 
spiritual  world  through  any  channel  —  save  one. 

This  one  exception  is,  as  we  have  seen,  the 
person  who  magnetized  him.  The  magnetizer  is, 
then,  the  one  and  only  medium  through  which 
the  person  magnetized  can  obtain  impressions: 
and  these  impressions  are  conveyed  directly  from 
the  mind,  or  spirit,  of  the  magnetizer  to  that  of  the 
magnetized.  Let  us  note,  further,  that  the  former 
is  not,  like  the  latter,  in  a  semi-disembodied  state, 
but  is  in  the  normal  exercise  of  his  bodily  func 
tions  and  faculties.  He  possesses,  consequently, 
his  normal  ability  to  originate  ideas  and  to  impart 
them :  and  whatever  ideas  he  chooses  to  impart 
to  the  magnetized  person,  the  latter  is  fain  pas 
sively  and  implicitly  to  accept.  And  having  so 
received  them,  they  descend  naturally  into  the 
automatic  mechanism  of  the  body,  and  are  by  it 
mechanically  interpreted  or  enacted. 

So  far,  the  theory  is  good :  but  something  seems 
amiss  in  the  working.  We  find  that  a  certain 
process  frequently  issues  in  a  certain  effect :  but 
we  do  not  yet  know  why  this  should  be  the  case. 


238  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

Some  fundamental  link  is  wanting ;  and  this  link 
is  manifestly  a  knowledge  of  the  true  relations 
between  mind  and  matter :  of  the  laws  to  which 
the  mental  or  spiritual  world  is  subject :  of  what 
nature  itself  is :  and  of  what  Creation  means. 
Let  us  cast  a  glance  at  these  fundamental  sub 
jects;  for  they  are  the  key  without  which  the 
secrets  of  magic  must  remain  locked  and  hidden. 

In  common  speech  we  call  the  realm  of  the 
material  universe,  Creation;  but  philosophy 
denies  its  claim  to  that  title.  Man  alone  is  Cre 
ation  :  everything  else  is  appearance.  The  uni 
verse  appears,  because  man  exists :  he  implies  the 
universe,  but  is  not  implied  by  it.  We  may  assist 
our  metaphysics,  here,  by  a  physical  illustration. 
Take  a  glass  prism  and  hold  in  the  sunlight  be 
fore  a  white  surface.  Let  the  prism  represent 
man  :  the  sun,  man's  Creator :  and  the  seven-hued 
ray  cast  by  the  prism,  nature,  or  the  material 
universe.  Now,  if  we  remove  the  light,  the  ray 
vanishes:  it  vanishes,  also,  if  we  take  away  the 
prism :  but  so  long  as  the  sun  and  the  prism  — 
God  and  man  —  remain  in  their  mutual  relation, 
so  long  must  the  rainbow  nature  appear.  Nature, 
in  short,  is  not  God ;  neither  is  it  man ;  but  it  is 
the  inevitable  concomitant  or  expression  of  the 


MODERN  MAGIC.  239 

creative  attitude  of  God  towards  man.  It  is  the 
shadow  of  the  elements  of  which  humanity  or 
human  nature  is  composed :  or,  shall  we  say,  it  is 
the  apparition  in  sense  of  the  spiritual  being  of 
mankind, —  not,  be  it  observed,  of  the  being  of 
any  individual  or  of  any  aggregation  of  indi 
viduals;  but  of  humanity  as  a  whole.  For  this 
reason,  also,  is  nature  orderly,  complete,  and  per 
manent, —  that  it  is  conditioned  not  upon  our  frail 
and  faulty  personalities,  but  upon  our  impersonal, 
universal  human  nature,  in  which  is  transacted 
the  miracle  of  God's  incarnation,  and  through 
which  He  forever  shines. 

Besides  Creator  and  creature,  nothing  else  can 
be ;  and  whatever  else  seems  to  be,  must  be  only 
a  seeming.  Nature,  therefore,  is  the  shadow  of  a 
shade,  but  it  serves  an  indispensable  use.  For 
since  there  can  be  no  direct  communication  be 
tween  finite  and  Infinite  —  God  and  man  —  a 
medium  or  common  ground  is  needed,  where  they 
may  meet ;  and  nature,  the  shadow  which  the 
Infinite  causes  the  finite  to  project,  is  just  that 
medium.  Man,  looking  upon  this  shadow,  mis 
takes  it  for  real  substance,  serving  him  for  foot 
hold  and  background,  and  assisting  him  to  attain 
self-consciousness.  God,  on  the  other  hand,  finds 


240  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

in  nature  the  means  of  revealing  Himself  to  His 
creature  without  compromising  the  creature's  free 
dom.  Man  supposes  the  universe  to  be  a  physi 
cal  structure  made  by  God  in  space  and  time,  and 
in  some  region  of  which  He  resides,  at  a  safe  dis 
tance  from  us  His  creatures :  whereas,  in  truth, 
God  is  distant  from  us  only  so  far  as  we  remove 
ourselves  from  our  own  inmost  intuitions  of  truth 
and  good. 

But  what  is  that  substance  or  quality  which 
underlies  and  gives  homogeneity  to  the  varying 
forms  of  nature,  so  that  they  seem  to  us  to  own  a 
common  origin?  —  what  is  that  logical  abstrac 
tion  upon  which  we  have  bestowed  the  name  of 
matter?  scientific  analysis  finds  matter  only  as 
forms,  never  as  itself:  until,  in  despair,  it  invents 
an  atomic  theory,  and  lets  it  go  at  that.  But  if, 
discarding  the  scientific  method,  we  question 
matter  from  the  philosophical  standpoint,  we  shall 
find  it  less  obdurate. 

Man,  considered  as  a  mind  or  spirit,  consists  of 
volition  and  intelligence ;  or,  what  is  the  same, 
of  emotion  or  affection,  and  of  the  thoughts  which 
are  created  by  this  affection.  Nothing  can  be 
affirmed  of  man  as  a  spirit  which  does  not  fall  un 
der  one  or  other  of  these  two  parts.  Now,  a  crea- 


MODERN  MAGIC.  241 

ture  consisting  solely  of  affections  and  thoughts 
must,  of  course,  have  something  to  love  and  to 
think  about.  Man's  final  destiny  is  no  doubt  to 
love  and  consider  his  Creator ;  but  that  can  only 
be  after  a  reactionary  or  regenerative  process  has 
begun  in  him.  Meanwhile,  he  must  love  and 
consider  the  only  other  available  object  —  that  is, 
himself.  Manifestly,  however,  in  order  to  bestow 
this  attention  upon  himself,  he  must  first  be  made 
aware  of  his  own  existence.  In  order  to  effect 
this,  something  must  be  added  to  man  as  spirit, 
enabling  him  to  discriminate  between  the  subject 
thinking  and  loving,  and  the  object  loved  arid 
thought  of.  This  additional  something,  again,  in 
order  to  fulful  its  purpose,  must  be  so  devised  as 
not  to  appear  an  addition:  it  must  seem  even 
more  truly  the  man  than  the  man  himself.  It 
must,  therefore,  perfectly  represent  or  correspond 
to  the  spiritual  form  and  constitution ;  so  that  the 
thoughts  and  affections  of  the  spirit  may  enter  in 
to  it  as  into  their  natural  home  and  continent. 

This  continent  or  vehicle  of  the  mind  is  the 
human  body.  The  body  has  two  aspects, —  sub 
stance  and  form,  answering  to  the  two  aspects  of 
the  mind, —  affection  and  thought:  and  affection 
finds  its  incarnation  or  correspondence  in  sub- 


242  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

stance ;  and  thought,  in  form.  The  mind,  in  short, 
realizes  itself  in  terms  of  its  reflection  in  the 
body,  much  as  the  body  realizes  itself  in  terms 
of  its  reflection  in  the  looking-glass :  but  it  does 
more  than  this,  for  it  identifies  itself  with  this 
its  image.  And  how  is  this  identification  made 
possible  ? 

It  is  brought  about  by  the  deception  of  sense, 
which  is  the  medium  of  communication  between 
the  spiritual  and  the  material  man.  Until  this 
miraculous  medium  is  put  in  action,  there  can  be 
no  conscious  relation  between  these  two  planes, 
admirably  as  they  are  adapted  to  each  other. 
Sense  is  spiritual  on  one  side  and  material  on 
the  other :  but  it  is  only  on  the  material  side  that 
it  gathers  its  reports :  on  the  spiritual  side  it  only 
delivers  them.  Every  one  of  the  five  messengers 
whereby  we  are  apprised  of  external  existence 
brings  us  an  earthly  message  only.  And  since 
these  messengers  act  spontaneously,  and  since  the 
mind's  only  other  source  of  knowledge  is  intui 
tion,  which  cannot  be  sensuously  confirmed, —  it 
is  little  wonder  if  man  has  inclined  to  the  persua 
sion  that  what  is  highest  in  him  is  but  an  attri 
bute  of  what  is  lowest,  and  that  when  the  body 
dies,  the  soul  must  follow  it  into  nothingness. 


MODERN  MAGIC.  243 

Creative  energy,  being  infinite,  passes  through 
the  world  of  causes  to  the  world  of  effects  — 
through  the  spiritual  to  the  physical  plane.  Mat 
ter  is  therefore  the  symbol  of  the  ultimate  of  crea 
tive  activity  ;  it  is  the  negative  of  God.  As  God 
is  infinite,  matter  is  finite  ;  as  He  is  life,  it  is 
death;  as  He  is  real,  it  is  unreal;  as  He  reveals, 
matter  veils.  And  as  the  relation  of  God  to 
man's  spirit  is  constant  and  eternal,  so  is  the 
physical  quality  of  matter  fixed  and  perma 
nent. 

Now,  in  order  to  arrive  at  a  comprehension  of 
what  matter  is  in  itself,  let  us  descend  from  the 
general  to  the  specific,  and  investigate  the  philo 
sophical  elements  of  a  pebble,  for  instance.  A 
pebble  is  two  things :  it  is  a  mineral :  and  it  is  a 
particular  concrete  example  of  mineral.  In  its 
mineral  aspect,  it  is  out  of  space  and  time,  and  is 
—  not  a  fact,  but  —  a  truth;  a  perception  of  the 
mind.  In  so  far  as  it  is  mineral,  therefore,  it  has 
no  relation  to  sense,  but  only  to  thought :  and  on 
the  other  hand,  in  so  far  as  it  is  a  particular  con 
crete  pebble,  it  is  cognizable  by  sense  but  not  by 
thought ;  for  what  is  in  sense  is  out  of  thought  : 
the  one  supersedes  the  other.  But  if  sense  thus 
absorbs  matter,  so  as  to  be  philosophically  indis- 


244  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

tinguishable  from  it,  we  are  constrained  to  iden 
tify  matter  with  our  sensuous  perception  of  it: 
and  if  our  exemplary  pebble  had  nothing  but  its 
material  quality  to  depend  upon,  it  would  cease 
to  exist  not  only  to  thought,  but  to  sense  like 
wise.  Its  metaphysical  aspect,  in  short,  is  the 
only  reality  appertaining  to  it.  Matter,  then, 
may  be  defined  as  the  impact  upon  sense  of  that 
prismatic  ray  which  we  have  called  nature. 

To  apply  this  discussion  to  the  subject  in  hand : 
Magic  is  a  sort  of  parody  of  reality.  And  when 
we  recognize  that  Creation  proceeds  from  within 
outwards,  or  endogenously ;  and  that  matter  is  not 
the  objective  but  the  subjective  side  of  the  uni 
verse,  we  are  in  a  position  to  perceive  that  in 
order  magically  to  control  matter,  we  must  apply 
our  efforts  not  to  matter  itself,  but  to  our  own 
minds.  The  natural  world  affects  us  from  with 
out  inwards:  the  magical  world  affects  us  from 
within  outwards :  instead  of  objects  suggesting 
ideas,  ideas  are  made  to  suggest  objects.  And  as, 
in  the  former  case,  when  the  object  is  removed 
the  idea  vanishes;  so  in  the  latter  case,  when 
the  idea  is  removed,  the  object  vanishes.  Both 
objects  are  illusions ;  but  the  illusion  in  the  first 
instance  is  the  normal  illusion  of  sense,  whereas 


MODEEN  MAGIC.  245 

in  the  second  instance  it  is  the  abnormal  illusion 
of  mind. 

The  above  argument  can  at  best  serve  only  as  a 
hint  to  such  as  incline  seriously  to  investigate  the 
subject,  and  perhaps  as  a  touchstone  for  testing 
the  validity  of  a  large  and  noisy  mass  of  preten 
sions  which  engage  the  student  at  the  outset 
of  his  enquiry.  Many  of  these  pretensions  are 
the  result  of  ignorance ;  many  of  deliberate  intent 
to  deceive  ;  some,  again,  of  erroneous  philosophi 
cal  theories.  The  Tibetan  adepts  seem  to  belong 
either  to  the  second  or  to  the  last  of  these  catego- 
ries? — or,  perhaps,  to  an  impartial  mingling  of 
all  three.  They  import  a  cumbrous  machinery  of 
auras,  astral  bodies,  and  elemental  spirits;  they 
divide  man  into  seven  principles,  nature  into 
seven  kingdoms;  they  regard  spirit  as  a  refined 
form  of  matter,  and  matter  as  the  one  absolute 
fact  of  the  universe, —  the  alpha  and  omega  of  all 
things.  They  deny  a  supreme  Deity,  but  hold 
out  hopes  of  a  practical  deityship  for  the  majority 
of  the  human  race.  In  short,  their  philosophy 
appeals  to  the  most  evil  instincts  of  the  soul,  and 
has  the  air  of  being  ex-post-facto ;  whenever  they 
run  foul  of  a  prodigy,  they  invent  abitrarily  a 
fanciful  explanation  of  it.  But  it  will  be  found, 


246  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

I  think,  that  the  various  phases  of  hypnotism, 
and  a  systematized  use  of  spiritism,  will  amply 
account  for  every  miracle  they  actually  bring  to 
pass. 

Upon  the  whole,  a  certain  vulgarity  is  insepara 
ble  from  even  the  most  respectable  forms  of 
magic, —  an  atmosphere  of  tinsel,  of  ostentation,  of 
big  cry  and  little  wool.  A  child  might  have  told 
us  that  matter  is  not  almighty,  that  minds  are 
sometimes  transparent  to  one  another,  that  love 
and  faith  can  work  wonders.  And  we  also  know 
that,  in  this  mortal  life,  our  means  are  exquisitely 
adapted  to  our  ends ;  and  that  we  can  gain  no 
solid  comfort  or  advantage  by  striving  to  elbow 
our  way  a  few  inches  further  into  the  region  of 
the  occult  and  abnormal.  Magic,  however  spe 
cious  its  achievements,  is  only  a  mockery  of  the 
Creative  power,  and  exposes  its  unlikeness  to 
it.  "It  is  the  attribute  of  natural  existence,"  a 
profound  writer  has  said,  "  to  be  a  form  of  use  to 
something  higher  than  itself,  so  that  whatever 
does  not,  either  potentially  or  actually,  possess 
within  it  this  soul  of  use,  does  not  honestly  be 
long  to  nature,  but  is  a  sensational  effect  pro 
duced  upon  the  individual  intelligence."  * 

*  Henry  James,  in  "  Society  the  Redeemed  Form  of  Man." 


MODERN  MAGIC.  247 

No  one  can  overstep  the  order  and  modesty  of 
general  existence  without  bringing  himself  into 
perilous  proximity  to  subjects  more  profound  and 
sacred  than  the  occasion  warrants.  Life  need  not 
be  barren  of  mystery  and  miracle  to  any  one  of 
us ;  but  they  shall  be  such  tender  mysteries  and 
instructive  miracles  as  the  devotion  of  mother 
hood,  and  the  blooming  of  spring.  We  are  too 
close  to  Infinite  love  and  wisdom  to  play  pranks 
before  it,  and  provoke  comparison  between  our 
paltry  juggleries  and  its  omnipotence  and  maj 
esty. 


CHAPTER  XL 

AMERICAN  WILD  ANIMALS  IN  ART. 

THE  hunter  and  the  sportsman  are  two  very 
different  persons.  The  hunter  pursues  animals 
because  he  loves  them  and  sympathizes  with 
them,  and  kills  them  as  the  champions  of  chivalry 
used  to  slay  one  another  —  courteously,  fairly, 
and  with  admiration  and  respect.  To  stalk  and 
shoot  the  elk  and  the  grizzly  bear  is  to  him  what 
wooing  and  winning  a  beloved  maiden  would  be 
to  another  man.  Far  from  being  the  foe  or 
exterminator  of  the  game  he  follows,  he,  more 
than  any  one  else,  is  their  friend,  vindicator,  and 
confidant.  A  strange  mutual  ardor  and  under 
standing  unites  him  with  his  quarry.  He  loves 
the  mountain  sheep  and  the  antelope,  because 
they  can  escape  him ;  the  panther  and  the  bear, 
because  they  can  destroy  him.  His  relations 
with  them  are  clean,  generous,  and  manly.  And 
on  the  other  hand,  the  wild  animals  whose  wild- 
ness  can  never  be  tamed,  whose  inmost  principle 

248 


AMERICAN  WILD  ANIMALS   IN  ART.         249 

of  existence  it  is  to  be  apart  and  unapproachable, 
—  those  creatures  who  may  be  said  to  cease  to  be 
when  they  cease  to  be  intractable,  —  seem,  after 
they  have  eluded  their  pursuer  to  the  utmost,  or 
fought  him  to  the  death,  to  yield  themselves  to 
him  with  a  sort  of  wild  contentment  —  as  if  they 
were  glad  to  admit  the  sovereignty  of  man,  though 
death  come  with  the  admission.     The  hunter,  in 
short,  asks  for  his  happiness  only  to  be  alone  with 
what  he  hunts;    the  sportsman,  after   his   day's 
sport,  must  needs  hasten  home  to  publish  the  size 
of  the  "  bag,"  and  to  wring  from  his  fellow-men 
the   glory  and   applause   which  he   has   not   the 
strength  and  simplicity  to  find  in  the  game  itself. 
But  if  the  true  hunter  is  rare,  the  union  of  the 
hunter  and  the  artist  is  rarer  still.    It  demands  not 
only  the  close  familiarity,  the  loving  observation, 
and  the  sympathy,  but  also  the  faculty  of  creation 
—  the  eye  which  selects  what  is  constructive  and 
beautiful,  and  passes  over  what  is  superfluous  and 
inharmonious,  and  the  hand  skilful  to  carry  out 
what  the  imagination  conceives.    In  the  man  whose 
work  I  am  about  to  consider,  these  qualities  are 
developed  in  a  remarkable  degree,  though  it  was 
not  until  he  was  a  man  grown,  and  had  fought 
with  distinction  through  the  civil  war,  that  he 


250  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

himself  became  aware  of  the  artistic  power  that 
was  in  him.  The  events  of  his  life,  could  they  be 
rehearsed  here,  would  form  a  tale  of  adventure  and 
vicissitude  more  varied  and  stirring  than  is  often 
found  in  fiction.  He  has  spent  by  himself  days 
and  weeks  in  the  vast  solitudes  of  our  western 
prairies  and  southern  morasses.  He  has  been  the 
companion  of  trappers  and  frontiersmen,  the 
friend  and  comrade  of  Indians,  sleeping  side  by 
side  with  them  in  their  wigwams,  running  the 
rapids  in  their  canoes,  and  riding  with  them  in 
the  hunt.  He  has  met  and  overcome  the  panther 
and  the  grizzly  single-handed,  and  has  pursued 
the  flying  cimmaroii  to  the  snowy  summits  of  the 
Rocky  Mountains,  and  brought  back  its  crescent 
horns  as  a  trophy.  He  has  fought  and  slain  the 
gray  wolf  with  no  other  weapons  than  his  hands 
and  teeth ;  and  at  night  he  has  lain  concealed  by 
lonely  tarns,  where  the  wild  coyote  came  to 
patter  and  bark  and  howl  at  the  midnight  moon. 
His  name  and  achievements  are  familiar  to  the 
dwellers  in  those  savage  regions,  whose  estimate 
of  a  man  is  based,  not  upon  his  social  and  finan 
cial  advantages,  but  upon  what  he  is  and  can  do. 
Yet  he  is  not  one  who  wears  his  merit  out 
wardly.  His  appearance,  indeed,  is  striking; 


AMERICAN  WILD  ANIMALS  IN  AKT.         251 

tall  and  athletic,  broad-shouldered  and  stout* 
limbed,  with  the  long,  elastic  step  of  the 
moccasined  Indian,  and  something  of  the  Indian's 
reticence  and  simplicity.  But  he  can  with  diffi 
culty  be  brought  to  allude  to  his  adventures,  and 
is  reserved  almost  to  the  point  of  ingenuity  on  all 
that  concerns  himself  or  redounds  to  his  credit. 
It  is  only  in  familiar  converse  with  friends  that 
the  humor,  the  cultivation,  the  knowledge,  and 
the  social  charm  of  the  man  appear,  and  his 
marvellous  gift  of  vivid  and  picturesque  narration 
discloses  itself.  But,  in  addition  to  all  this,  or 
above  it  all,  he  is  the  only  great  animal  sculptor 
of  his  time,  the  successor  of  the  French  Barye, 
and  (as  any  one  may  satisfy  himself  who  will  take 
the  trouble  to  compare  their  works)  the  equal  of 
that  famous  artist  in  scope  and  treatment  of  ani 
mal  subjects,  and  his  superior  in  knowledge  and 
in  truth  and  power  of  conception.  It  would  be 
a  poor  compliment  to  call  Edward  Kemeys  the 
American  Barye;  but  Barye  is  the  only  man  whose 
animal  sculptures  can  bear  comparison  with  Mr. 
Kemeys's. 

Of  Mr.  Kemeys's  productions,  a  few  are  to  be 
seen  at  his  studio,  133  West  Fifty-third  Street, 
New  York  city.  These  are  the  models,  in  clay 


252  CONFESSIONS  AND  CRITICISMS. 

or  plaster,  as  they  came  fresh  from  the  artist's 
hand.  From  this  condition  they  can  either  be 
enlarged  to  life  or  colossal  size,  for  parks  or  pub 
lic  buildings,  or  cast  in  bronze  in  their  present 
dimensions  for  the  enrichment  of  private  houses. 
Though  this  collection  includes  scarce  a  tithe  of 
what  the  artist  has  produced,  it  forms  a  series  of 
groups  and  figures  which,  for  truth  to  nature, 
artistic  excellence,  and  originality,  are  actually 
unique.  So  unique  are  they,  indeed,  that  the 
uneducated  eye  does  not  at  first  realize  their 
really  immense  value.  Nothing  like  this  little 
sculpture  gallery  has  been  seen  before,  and  it  is 
very  improbable  that  there  will  ever  again  be  a 
meeting  of  conditions  and  qualities  adequate  to 
reproducing  such  an  exhibition.  For  we  see 
here  not  merely,  nor  chiefly,  the  accurate  rep 
resentation  of  the  animal's  external  aspect,  but  — 
what  is  vastly  more  difficult  to  seize  and  por 
tray — the  essential  animal  character  or  temper 
ament  which  controls  and  actuates  the  animal's 
movements  and  behavior.  Each  one  of  Mr. 
Kemeys's  figures  gives  not  only  the  form  and 
proportions  of  the  animal,  according  to  the  nicest 
anatomical  studies  and  measurements,  but  it  is 
the  speaking  embodiment  of  profound  insight  into 


AMERICAN   WILD   ANIMALS   IN   ART.          253 

that  animal's  nature  and  knowledge  of  its  habits. 
The  spectator  cannot  long  examine  it  without 
feeling  that  he  has  learned  much  more  of  its  char 
acteristics  and  genius  than  if  he  had  been  stand 
ing  in  front  of  the  same  animal's  cage  at  the 
Zoological  Gardens;  for  here  is  an  artist  who 
understands  how  to  translate  pose  into  meaning, 
and  action  into  utterance,  and  to  select  those 
poses  and  actions  which  convey  the  broadest  and 
most  comprehensive  idea  of  the  subject's  pre 
vailing  traits.  He  not  only  knows  what  posture 
or  movement  the  anatomical  structure  of  the 
animal  renders  possible,  but  he  knows  precisely 
in  what  degree  such  posture  or  movement  is 
modified  by  the  animal's  physical  needs  and  in 
stincts.  In  other  words,  he  always  respects  the 
modesty  of  nature,  and  never  yields  to  the  temp 
tation  to  be  dramatic  and  impressive  at  the 
expense  of  truth.  Here  is  none  of  Barye's  ex 
aggeration,  or  of  Landseer's  sentimental  effort  to 
humanize  animal  nature.  Mr.  Kemeys  has  rightly 
perceived  that  animal  nature  is  not  a  mere  con 
traction  of  human  nature ;  but  that  each  animal, 
so  far  as  it  owns  any  relation  to  man  at  all,  rep 
resents  the  unimpeded  development  of  some  par 
ticular  element  of  man's  nature.  Accordingly, 


254  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

animals  must  be  studied  and  portrayed  solely 
upon  their  own  basis  arid  within  their  own  limits ; 
and  he  who  approaches  them  with  this  under 
standing  will  find,  possibly  to  his  surprise,  that 
the  theatre  thus  afforded  is  wide  and  varied 
enough  for  the  exercise  of  his  best  ingenuity  and 
capacities.  At  first,  no  doubt,  the  simple  animal 
appears  too  simple  to  be  made  artistically  in 
teresting,  apart  from  this  or  that  conventional  or 
imaginative  addition.  The  lion  must  be  pre 
sented,  not  as  he  is,  but  as  vulgar  anticipation 
expects  him  to  be ;  not  with  the  savageness  and 
terror  which  are  native  to  him,  but  with  the 
savageness  and  terror  w.hich  those  who  have 
trembled  and  fled  at  the  echo  of  his  roar  invest 
him  with, —  which  are  quite  another  matter.  Zoo 
logical  gardens  and  museums  have  their  uses,  but 
they  cannot  introduce  us  to  wild  animals  as  they 
really  are ;  and  the  reports  of  those  who  have 
caught  terrified  or  ignorant  glimpses  of  them  in 
their  native  regions  will  mislead  us  no  less  in 
another  direction.  Nature  reveals  her  secrets 
only  to  those  who  have  faithfully  and  rigorously 
submitted  to  the  initiation;  but  to  them  she 
shows  herself  marvellous  and  inexhaustible.  The 
"  simple  animal "  avouches  his  ability  to  transcend 


AMERICAN   WILD   ANIMALS   IN   ART.          255 

any  imaginative  conception  of  him.  The  stern 
economy  of  his  structure  and  character,  the  sure- 
ness  and  sufficiency  of  his  every  manifestation, 
the  instinct  and  capacity  which  inform  all  his 
proceedings, —  these  are  things  which  are  con 
cealed  from  a  hasty  glance  by  the  very  perfection 
of  their  state.  Once  seen  and  comprehended, 
however,  they  work  upon  the  mind  of  the  observer 
with  an  ever  increasing  power;  they  lead  him 
into  a  new,  strange,  and  fascinating  world,  and 
generously  recompense  him  for  any  effort  he  may 
have  made  to  penetrate  thither.  Of  that  strange 
and  fascinating  world  Mr.  Kemeys  is  the  true  and 
worthy  interpreter,  and,  so  far  as  appears,  the 
only  one.  Through  difficulty  and  discouragement 
of  all  kinds,  he  has  kept  to  the  simple  truth,  and 
the  truth  has  rewarded  him.  He  has  done  a  ser 
vice  of  incalculable  value  to  his  county,  not  only 
in  vindicating  American  art,  but  in  preserving  to 
us,  in  a  permanent  and  beautiful  form,  the  vivid 
and  veracious  figures  of  a  wild  fauna  which,  in 
the  inevitable  progress  of  colonization  and  civil 
ization,  is  destined  within  a  few  years  to  vanish 
altogether.  The  American  bear  and  bison,  the 
cimmaron  and  the  elk,  the  wolf  and  the  'coon  — 
where  will  they  be  a  generation  hence?  No- 


256  CONFESSIONS  AND   CRITICISMS. 

where,  save  in  the  possession  of  those  persons  who 
have  to-day  the  opportunity  and  the  intelligence 
to  decorate  their  rooms  and  parks  with  Mr. 
Kemeys's  inimitable  bronzes.  The  opportunity  is 
great  —  much  greater,  I  should  think,  than  the 
intelligence  necessary  for  availing  ourselves  of  it ; 
and  it  is  a  unique  opportunity.  In  other  words, 
it  lies  within  the  power  of  every  cultivated  family 
in  the  United  States  to  enrich  itself  with  a  work 
of  art  which  is  entirely  American ;  which,  as  art, 
fulfils  every  requirement ;  which  is  of  permanent 
and  increasing  interest  and  value  from  an  orna 
mental  point  of  view;  and  which  is  embodied  in 
the  most  enduring  of  artistic  materials. 

The  studio  in  which  Mr.  Kemeys  works  —  a 
spacious  apartment  —  is,  in  appearance,  a  cross 
between  a  barn-loft  and  a  wigwam.  Round  the 
walls  are  suspended  the  hides,  the  heads,  and 
the  horns  of  the  animals  which  the  hunter  has 
shot;  and  below  are  groups,  single  figures,  and 
busts,  modelled  by  the  artist,  in  plaster,  terra 
cotta,  or  clay.  The  colossal  design  of  the  "Still 
Hunt"  —  an  American  panther  crouching  before 
its  spring  —  was  modelled  here,  before  being  cast 
in  bronze  and  removed  to  its  present  site  in  Cen 
tral  Park.  It  is  a  monument  of  which  New  York 


AMERICAN  WILD  ANIMALS  IN  ART.         257 

and  America  may  be  proud ;  for  no  such  powerful 
and  veracious  conception  of  a  wild  animal  has 
ever  before  found  artistic  embodiment.  The 
great  cat  crouches  with  head  low,  extended 
throat,  and  ears  erect.  The  shoulders  are  drawn 
far  back,  the  fore  paws  huddled  beneath  the 
jaws.  The  long^  lithe  back  rises  in  an  arch  in 
the  middle,  sinking  thence  to  the  haunches, 
while  the  angry  tail  makes  a  strong  curve  along 
the  ground  to  the  right.  The  whole  figure  is 
tense  and  compact  with  restrained  and  waiting 
power;  the  expression  is  stealthy,  pitiless,  and 
terrible ;  it  at  once  fascinates  and  astounds  the 
beholder.  While  Mr.  Kemeys  was  modelling 
this  animal,  an  incident  occurred  which  he  has 
told  me  in  something  like  the  following  words. 
The  artist  does  not  encourage  the  intrusion  of 
idle  persons  while  he  is  at  work,  though  no 
one  welcomes  intelligent  inspection  and  criti 
cism  more  cordially  than  he.  On  this  occasion 
he  was  alone  in  the  studio  with  his  Irish  facto 
tum,  Tom,  and  the  outer  door,  owing  to  the  heat 
of  the  weather,  had  been  left  ajar.  All  of  a 
sudden  the  artist  was  aware  of  the  presence  of  a 
stranger  in  the  room.  "He  was  a  tall,  hulking 
fellow,  shabbily  dressed,  like  a  tramp,  and  looked 


258  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

as  if  he  might  make  trouble  if  he  had  a  mind  to. 
However,  he  stood  quite  still  in  front  of  the 
statue,  staring  at  it,  and  not  saying  anything. 
So  I  let  him  alone  for  a  while ;  I  thought  it  would 
be  time  enough  to  attend  to  him  when  he  began 
to  beg  or  make  a  row.  But  after  some  time,  as 
he  still  hadn't  stirred,  Tom  came  to  the  conclu 
sion  that  a  hint  had  better  be  given  him  to  move 
on ;  so  he  took  a  broom  and  began  sweeping  the 
floor,  and  the  dust  went  all  over  the  fellow ; 
but  he  didn't  pay  the  least  attention.  I  began 
to  think  there  would  probably  be  a  fight ;  but  I 
thought  I'd  wait  a  little  longer  before  doing 
anything.  At  last  I  said  to  him,  '  Will  you 
move  aside,  please?  You're  in  my  way.'  He 
stepped  over  a  little  to  the  right,  but  still  didn't 
open  his  mouth,  and  kept  his  eyes  fixed  on  the 
panther.  Presently  I  said  to  Tom,  4  Well,  Tom, 
the  cheek  of  some  people  passes  belief!'  Tom 
replied  with  more  clouds  of  dust;  but  the 
stranger  never  made  a  sign.  At  last  I  got  tired, 
so  I  stepped  up  to  the  fellow  and  said  to  him  : 
'  Look  here,  my  friend,  when  I  asked  you  to  move 
aside,  I  meant  you  should  move  the  other  side  of 
the  door.'  He  roused  up  then,  and  gave  himself 
a  shake,  and  took  a  last  look  at  the  panther,  and 


AMERICAN  WILD  ANIMALS  IN  ART.         259 

said  he,  4  That's  all  right,  boss ;  I  know  all  about 
the  door;  but — what  a  spring  she's  going  to 
make ! '  Then,"  added  Kemeys,  self-reproach- 
f  ully,  "  I  could  have  wept !  " 

But  although  this  superb  figure  no  longer  dom 
inates  the  studio,  there  is  no  lack  of  models  as 
valuable  and  as  interesting,  though  not  of  heroic 
size.  Most  interesting  of  all  to  the  general  ob 
server  are,  perhaps,  the  two  figures  of  the  grizzly 
bear.  These  were  designed  from  a  grizzly  which 
Mr.  Kemeys  fought  and  killed  in  the  autumn  of 
1881  in  the  Rocky  Mountains,  and  the  mounted 
head  of  which  grins  upon  the  wall  overhead,  a 
grisly  trophy  indeed.  The  impression  of  enor 
mous  strength,  massive  yet  elastic,  ponderous  yet 
alert,  impregnable  for  defence  as  irresistible  in 
attack ;  a  strength  which  knows  no  obstacles,  and 
which  never  meets  its  match, —  this  impression  is 
as  fully  conveyed  in  these  figures,  which  are  not 
over  a  foot  in  height,  as  if  the  animal  were  before 
us  in  its  natural  size.  You  see  the  vast  limbs, 
crooked  with  power,  bound  about  with  huge  ropes 
and  plates  of  muscle,  and  clothed  in  shaggy 
depths  of  fur ;  the  vast  breadth  of  the  head,  with 
its  thick,  low  ears,  dull,  small  eyes,  and  long  up- 
curving  snout ;  the  roll  and  lunge  of  the  gait,  like 


260  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

the  motion  of  a  vessel  plunging  forward  before 
the  wind;  the  rounded  immensity  of  the  trunk, 
and  the  huge  bluntness  of  the  posteriors ;  and  all 
these  features  are  combined  with  such  masterly 
unity  of  conception  and  plastic  vigor,  that  the 
diminutive  model  insensibly  grows  mighty  be 
neath  your  gaze,  until  you  realize  the  monster  as 
if  he  stood  stupendous  and  grim  before  you.  In 
the  first  of  the  figures  the  bear  has  paused  in  his 
great  stride  to  paw  over  and  snuff  at  the  horned 
head  of  a  mountain  sheep,  half  buried  in  the  soil. 
The  action  of  the  right  arm  and  shoulder,  and  the 
burly  slouch  of  the  arrested  stride,  are  of  them 
selves  worth  a  gallery  of  pseudo-classic  Venuses 
and  Roman  senators.  The  other  bear  is  lolling 
back  on  his  haunches,  with  all  four  paws  in  the 
air,  munching  some  grapes  from  a  vine  which  he 
has  torn  from  its  support.  The  contrast  between 
the  savage  character  of  the  beast  and  his  absurdly 
peaceful  employment  gives  a  touch  of  terrific 
comedy  to  this  design.  After  studying  these 
figures,  one  cannot  help  thinking  what  a  noble 
embellishment  either  of  them  would  be,  put  in 
bronze,  of  colossal  size,  in  the  public  grounds  of 
one  of  our  great  Western  cities.  And  inasmuch 
as  the  rich  citizens  of  the  West  not  only  know 


AMERICAN   WILD   ANIMALS   IN   ABT.         261 

what  a  grizzly  bear  is,  but  are  more  fearless  and 
independent,  and  therefore  often  more  correct  in 
their  artistic  opinion  than  the  somewhat  sophis 
ticated  critics  of  the  East,  there  is  some  cause  for 
hoping  that  this  thing  may  be  brought  to  pass. 

Beside  the  grizzly  stands  the  mountain  sheep, 
or  cimmaron,  the  most  difficult  to  capture  of  all 
four-footed  animals,  whose  gigantic  curved  horns 
are  the  best  trophy  of  skill  and  enterprise  that  a 
hunter  can  bring  home  with  him.  The  sculptor 
has  here  caught  him  in  one  of  his  most  character 
istic  attitudes  —  just  alighted  from  some  dizzy 
leap  on  the  headlong  slope  of  a  rocky  mountain 
side.  On  such  a  spot  nothing  but  the  cimmaron 
could  retain  its  footing ;  yet  there  he  stands, 
firm  and  secure  as  the  rock  itself,  his  fore  feet 
planted  close  together,  the  fore  legs  rigid  and 
straight  as  the  shaft  of  a  lance,  while  the  hind 
legs  pose  easily  in  attendance  upon  them.  "  The 
cimmaron  always  strikes  plumb-centre,  and  he 
never  makes  a  mistake,"  is  Mr.  Kemeys's  laconic 
comment ;  and  we  can  recognize  the  truth  of  the 
observation  in  this  image.  Perfectly  at  home 
and  comfortable  on  its  almost  impossible  perch, 
the  cimmaron  curves  its  great  neck  and  turns  its 
head  upward,  gazing  aloft  toward  the  height 


262  CONFESSIONS   AND  CRITICISMS. 

whence  it  has  descended.  "  It's  the  golden  eagle 
he  hears,"  says  the  sculptor;  "they  give  him 
warning  of  danger."  It  is  a  magnificent  animal, 
a  model  of  tireless  vigor  in  all  its  parts ;  a  creature 
made  to  hurl  itself  head-foremost  down  appalling 
gulfs  of  space,  and  poise  itself  at  the  bottom  as 
jauntily  as  if  gravitation  were  but  a  bugbear  of 
timid  imaginations.  I  find  myself  unconsciously 
speaking  about  these  plaster  models  as  if  they 
were  the  living  animals  which  they  represent; 
but  the  more  one  studies  Mr.  Kemeys's  works,  the 
more  instinct  with  redundant  and  breathing  life 
do  they  appear. 

It  would  be  impossible  even  to  catalogue  the 
contents  of  this  studio,  the  greater  part  of  which  is 
as  well  worth  describing  as  those  examples  which 
have  already  been  touched  upon  ;  nor  could  a  more 
graphic  pen  than  mine  convey  an  adequate  impres 
sion  of  their  excellence.  But  there  is  here  a  figure 
of  the  'coon,  which,  as  it  is  the  only  one  ever 
modelled,  ought  not  to  be  passed  over  in  silence- 
In  appearance  this  animal  is  a  curious  medley  of 
the  fox,  the  wolf,  and  the  bear,  besides  I-know-not- 
what  (as  the  lady  in  "Punch  "  would  say)  that 
belongs  to  none  of  those  beasts.  As  may  be  im 
agined,  therefore,  its  right  portrayal  involves 


AMERICAN   WILD   ANIMALS   IN   ART.          263 

peculiar  difficulties,  and  Mr.  Kemeys's  genius  is 
nowhere  better  shown  than  in  the  manner  in 
which  these  have  been  surmounted.  Compact, 
plump,  and  active  in  figure,  quick  and  subtle  in 
its  movements,  the  'coon  crouches  in  a  flattened 
position  along  the  limb  of  a  tree,  its  broad,  shal 
low  head  and  pointed  snout  a  little  lifted,  as  it 
gazes  alertly  outward  and  downward.  It  sustains 
itself  by  the  clutch  of  its  slender-clawed  toes  on 
the  branch,  the  fore  legs  being  spread  apart,  while 
the  left  hind  leg  is  withdrawn  inward,  and  enters 
smoothly  into  the  contour  of  the  furred  side; 
the  bushy,  fox-like  tail,  ringed  with  dark  and 
light  bands,  curving  to  the  left.  Thus  posed  and 
modelled  in  high  relief  on  a  tile-shaped  plaque, 
Mr.  Kemeys's  coon  forms  a  most  desirable  orna 
ment  for  some  wise  man's  sideboard  or  mantle- 
piece,  where  it  may  one  day  be  pointed  out  as 
the  only  surviving  representative  of  its  species. 

The  two  most  elaborate  groups  here  have 
already  attained  some  measure  of  publicity;  the 
"Bison  and  Wolves"  having  been  exhibited  in 
the  Paris  Salon  in  1878,  and  the  "  Deer  and  Pan 
ther"  having  been  purchased  in  bronze  by  Mr. 
Winans  during  the  sculptor's  sojourn  in  England. 
Each  group  represents  one  of  those  deadly  com- 


264  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

bats  between  wild  beasts  which  are  among  the 
most  terrific  and  at  the  same  time  most  natural 
incidents  of  animal  existence ;  and  they  are  of 
especial  interest  as  showing  the  artist's  power  of 
concentrated  and  graphic  composition.  A  com 
plicated  story  is  told  in  both  these  instances  with 
a  masterly  economy  of  material  and  balance  of 
proportion ;  so  that  the  spectator's  eye  takes  in 
the  whole  subject  at  a  glance,  and  yet  finds  in 
exhaustible  interest  in  the  examination  of  details, 
all  of  which  contribute  to  the  central  effect  with 
out  distracting  the  attention.  A  companion 
piece  to  the  "  Deer  and  Panther  "  shows  the  same 
animals  as  they  have  fallen,  locked  together  in 
death  after  the  combat  is  over.  In  the  former 
group,  the  panther,  in  springing  upon  the  deer, 
had  impaled  its  neck  on  the  deer's  right  antler, 
and  had  then  swung  round  under  the  latter's 
body,  burying  the  claws  of  its  right  fore  foot  in 
the  ruminant's  throat.  In  order  truthfully  to 
represent  the  second  stage  of  the  encounter, 
therefore,  it  was  necessary  not  merely  to  model 
a  second  group,  but  to  retain  the  elements  and 
construction  of  the  first  group  under  totally 
changed  conditions.  This  is  a  feat  of  such 
peculiar  difficulty  that  I  think  few  artists  in  any 


AMERICAN  WILD   ANIMALS   IN   ART.         265 

branch  of  art  would  venture  to  attempt  it ;  never 
theless,  Mr.  Kemeys  has  accomplished  it;  and 
the  more  the  two  groups  are  studied  in  connec 
tion  with  each  other,  the  more  complete  will  his 
success  be  found  to  have  been.  The  man  who 
can  do  this  may  surely  be  admitted  a  master, 
whose  works  are  open  only  to  affirmative  criti 
cism.  For  his  works  the  most  trying  of  all  tests 
is  their  comparison  with  one  another;  and  the 
result  of  such  comparison  is  not  merely  to  con 
firm  their  merit,  but  to  illustrate  and  enhance  it. 

For  my  own  part,  my  introduction  to  Mr. 
Kemeys's  studio  was  the  opening  to  me  of  a  new 
world,  where  it  has  been  my  good  fortune  to 
spend  many  days  of  delightful  and  enlightening 
study.  How  far  the  subject  of  this  writing  may 
have  been  already  familiar  to  the  readers  of  it,  I 
have  no  means  of  knowing ;  but  I  conceive  it  to 
be  no  less  than  my  duty,  as  a  countryman  of  Mr. 
Kemeys's  and  a  lover  of  all  that  is  true  and 
original  in  art,  to  pay  the  tribute  of  my  appreci 
ation  to  what  he  has  done.  There  is  no  danger  of 
his  getting  more  recognition  than  he  deserves, 
and  he  is  not  one  whom  recognition  can  injure. 
He  reverences  his  art  too  highly  to  magnify  his 
own  exposition  of  it;  and  when  he  reads  what  I 


266  CONFESSIONS   AND   CRITICISMS. 

have  set  down  here,  he  will  smile  and  shake  his 
head,  and  mutter  that  I  have  divined  the  perfect 
idea  in  the  imperfect  embodiment.  Unless  I 
greatly  err,  however,  no  one  but  himself  is 
competent  to  take  that  exception.  The  genuine 
artist  is  never  satisfied  with  his  work ;  he  per 
ceives  where  it  falls  short  of  his  conception. 
But  to  others  it  will  not  be  incomplete  ;  for  the 
achievements  of  real  art  are  always  invested  with 
an  atmosphere  and  aroma  —  a  spiritual  quality 
perhaps  —  proceeding  from  the  artist's  mind  and 
affecting  that  of  the  beholder.  And  thus  it 
happens  that  the  story  or  the  poem,  the  picture 
or  the  sculpture,  receives  even  in  its  material 
form  that  last  indefinable  grace,  that  magic  light 
that  never  was  on  sea  or  land,  which  no  pen  or 
brush  or  graving-tool  has  skill  to  seize.  Matter 
can  never  rise  to  the  height  of  spirit ;  but  spirit 
informs  it  when  it  has  done  its  best,  and  ennobles 
it  with  the  charm  that  the  artist  sought  and  the 
world  desired. 

#*#  Since  the  above  was  written,  Mr.  Kemeys  has  removed 
his  studio  to  Perth  Amboy,  N.  J. 


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